


Amnesty Fics

by Vagrant_Blvrd



Category: Rooster Teeth/Achievement Hunter RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe- GTA V, F/M, Fake AH Crew, Friends With Benefits, Gen, M/M, Multi, Pre-Fake AH Crew, Pre-Relationship
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-10-14
Updated: 2020-06-13
Packaged: 2020-12-14 21:36:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 25,596
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21022646
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Vagrant_Blvrd/pseuds/Vagrant_Blvrd
Summary: Cleaning out my WiP folder and decided to post fics/projects that I'm not likely to continue at this point for ~closure.Rough drafts that I've done a quick clean-up on. If I still have notes/outlines for them I'll add those in as well.Various pairings/ships and AUs. (Grab bag of the stuff I've lost interest in/wrote myself into a corner with and was allhuhabout and decided never to speak of again. Until now, because why not.)¯\_(ツ)_/¯





	1. FAHC AU: Unifinished Sequel to Gather No Moss (Freewood)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This was supposed to be a sequel to [Gather No Moss](https://archiveofourown.org/works/11252637) that just kind of stalled on me until my old laptop died in the middle of working on this and took about four thousand words of fic and my latest my notes on this with it, so yes. :D???

Ryan may not have Gavin's finesse when it comes to breaking and entering, but he's not completely hopeless in that department. 

“Is this you returning the favor, then?” Gavin asks, Cat hissing softly in his arms as Ryan closes the window behind him. “Cheeky.”

Ryan rolls his eyes, lips curling upwards. “Still an asshole, I see.”

“Ryan, you're such a sweet talker, Ryan.”

“I was talking to Cat, but sure, you too.”

Cat lets out an angry sound and wriggles out of Gavin's arms to disappear down the hallway leaving the two of them alone in Gavin's living room. (Staring at one another awkwardly, because that's who they are, it would seem.)

“I, ah,” Gavin says, flailing a hand between them. “Hi, Ryan.”

Gavin's smiling up at him, cautiously hopeful and all over an awkward dork. Something that Ryan, finds endearing.

“Hi, Gavin.”

========

Cat's being pissy about Ryan's absence, scratching his belongings up if he's stupid enough to leave them out. Peeing in or on anything he can get to with a malicious glee.

The Edgars, on the other hand, are thrilled to see him again. Twining between his legs when he's trying to walk anywhere in Gavin's place and climbing all over him if he stands still long enough. Like to leap from the top of the fridge or a cabinet to land on his shoulder, butting their head against his cheek and purring happily.

“Looks like they missed you.”

Ryan has Edgar II and Edgar III using him as their own personal jungle gym, and Edgar I is down at foot level, tripping him up at every turn.

“Oh? You don't say.”

Gavin grins at him, boosting himself up to sit on the kitchen counter to watch Ryan try to navigate his way to the stove with his passengers and furry little hindrance in tow. 

“No, I'm serious, Ryan. I've got a sense about these things.”

Ryan snorts, looking down at the Edgars who are looking right back at him expectantly. Sees Cat at the corner of his eye, lurking like the creepy little bastard he is. (Wonders if this is how the cats react to him being back, what the hell would Russel be like?)

========

Ryan still has his safe houses in Los Santos. The ones he used frequently and the ones he only went to when shit went wrong. (Really, really, wrong.)

The one where he ended up collecting stray after stray, including one scruffy little British asshole. 

Ryan may or may not have said that last part out loud because he can hear Gavin headed towards the kitchen, talking to one of the Edgars who meows back like they're having a conversation of great import.

“Well that's rude of you, Ryan,” Gavin says, nudging Edgar I out of the doorway to his kitchen with a foot. 

Point is, there are a lot of places Ryan could stay now he's back in the city. Loads, as Gavin might say, and yet he's been sleeping in Gavin's spare room for the past week.

Ryan shrugs, reaching down to scritch Edgar I's chin when he bumps up against his leg, begging for attention. “Accurate, though.”

Gavin grumbles, settling down at the table next to Ryan with a mug of tea. 

“You can just stay here, you know,” he offers, stealing a look at the screen of Ryan's laptop as he takes a sip of his tea. All casual indifference. “I've got the room.”

Ryan glances at him, watches Gavin scrolling through the messages on his phone. Totally indifferent, that one. No concern of his where Ryan ends up, no. 

None at all.

“But does this place have a stunning view of an alley straight out of a horror movie?” Ryan asks. “If not, that could be a deal breaker.”

Gavin sets his mug down and looks at him, long and level. 

“You're a lunatic, Ryan,” he says, like this is news. “And I'm rightfully concerned.”

He should be, is the thing.

========

“Geoff wants to arrange a meet,” Gavin says a few days later, when Ryan's doing a little homework, a little research, feet up on Gavin's coffee table.

“You mentioned that, yeah,” Ryan says, just to be an asshole. “Multiple times.”

Gavin huffs, walking around to see what Ryan's doing because he's a nosy bastard who doesn't know what boundaries are. “He's keen on you working with us.”

Like Gavin hasn't been dropping hints here and there once Ryan got back to Los Santos. Heavy little sighs over breakfast and pointed looks when Ryan would turn on the news to watch the latest developments about the new crew throwing Los Santos into a frenzy.

“Oh,” Ryan says, eyes flicking up to meet Gavin's. “He's _keen_.”

Gavin rolls his eyes and drops next to Ryan on the couch, reaching over to grab the laptop from him, which is fair since it is Gavin's.

“Geoff hates that picture,” he says, minimizing the window that has a huge splash picture of Geoff taken during a heist the Fakes pulled a few months back. “Says they didn't get his good side.”

Ryan makes a humming noise, letting Gavin bring up other news stories. The ones that don't mention the Fakes by name. Don't mention anyone by name and have a hot-line number at the end of the article requesting information from anyone who might know something.

“I'm surprised,” Ryan says, “I had no idea your crew isn't all about ending up on the evening news or front page of the paper.”

Gavin scowls at him, but there's no heat to it.

“Look,” he says, faltering as Ryan looks at him. “It's all about creating a reputation for ourselves, isn't it?”

Oh, Ryan understands that. Boy, does he. 

Gavin won't quite look at him while he brings up more articles, interesting little things that have the Fakes fingerprints all over them. The only thing is, there's a difference between making a reputation and whatever it is the Fakes end up doing more often than not. 

“Sure,” Ryan says. “Of course.”

Gavin sighs, closing the browser windows to bring up a folder, and eyes Ryan.

“What you're about to see,” he says, voice solemn despite the glimmer of amusement in his eyes. “Is top secret, Ryan. Very hush, hush. No one can know.”

“Oh?”

Gavin nods and opens the folder to reveal videos. A lot of videos, all with time-stamps from the last few months.

Gavin clicks on one and Ryan snorts when he sees Cat's grumpy, unimpressed face come into focus, Edgar I stalking his tail.

“I may have filmed more videos of them than the ones I sent you,” Gavin says, quiet and a little embarrassed as the video continues to play. “Thought you might like to see them.”

Ryan doesn't bother hiding his smile, not when Gavin leans into him. Angles the laptop so they can both watch the videos of Ryan's idiot cats because that's a thing a pair of hardened criminals like them do in their off-time.

========

Ryan agrees to meet with Geoff and the rest of the Fakes, and that's when he realizes Gavin hasn't told his crew that Ryan's been in Los Santos for the past month. That he's been staying with Gavin.

“Er, ah,” Gavin says, when Ryan just looks at him. “It never came up?”

Oh, really.

Geoff Ramsey has been so keen on Ryan working with his crew he went through Gavin to extend an offer when Ryan left Los Santos. Has continued to do so over the last little while, and somehow, somehow, it never occurred to Gavin to tell him Ryan was back in the city. Was in his spare bedroom.

“You don't say,” Ryan says, and now Gavin's frowning up at him.

“Well,” Gavin says. “I wasn't about to tell the others when you were faffing about trying to decide if you wanted to accept Geoff's offer or not.”

Ryan stares at him, mouths, _faffing about_ to himself a few times because it's one of the most ridiculous things he's heard come out of Gavin's mouth, and that's saying something.

“Oh, shut up,” Gavin says. “You know what I mean.”

He does, actually. 

Ryan never told Gavin to keep Ryan's presence in Los Santos a secret, but he did, and that. 

“I do,” Ryan says, and Gavin must hear the things Ryan isn't saying. 

Grateful that the trust he's put in him isn't misplaced, that he appreciates what Gavin's done, because he smiles, stupid and a little crooked. 

========

There's a fine line between paranoia and taking reasonable precautions, or so Ryan's heard. 

There's also a healthy debate going on where that line stands, which. 

Great, fantastic.

Ryan's more than happy to let others quibble over that kind of thing while he compromises and goes with being reasonably paranoid because that's worked out for him in the past. (He's still alive.)

It's what has him going to the address Gavin gives him three hours early only to find a sniper set up on the roof of of a nearby building. 

A sniper holding a hot pink sniper rifle and wearing a purple hoodie that makes him stand out like a sore thumb.

Ryan sighs, because he recognizes the sniper from half a dozen videos Gavin had sent him while he was away from Los Santos. 

The reasonably paranoid part of Ryan is having a grand old shitfit while the rest of him considers the situation carefully.

The sniper doesn't seem to have noticed Ryan, which is nice. Gives him the chance to pull his phone out, ignoring the little voice in his head telling him he's not being paranoid enough as he takes a picture of the sniper and sends out a text to Gavin.

He's banking hard on the assumption Gavin wouldn't have gone through the trouble of keeping Ryan's presence in Los Santos from his boss and arranging this meet just to have Ryan offed before it starts.

Putting a lot of trust into this little thing going on between them.

Gavin replies immediately, something easing in Ryan's chest as he reads the text.

_Please don't kill Ray. It would make things awkward._

Ryan stares at his phone for a long, long moment, and then looks up to where the sniper – Ray – is positioned. 

He doesn't know what's given him away, assumes Gavin must have sent Ray a text of his own because he moves to the edge of the roof with his rifle over his shoulder and zeroes in on where Ryan's standing. 

And then, because they haven't been weird enough, Ray raises a hand to toss off a mocking salute before moving back into position.

“What the fuck is wrong with these people?” Ryan mutters, glaring at his phone when it buzzes again.

_Seriously, don't kill him. He owes me twenty quid_.

========

Geoff smirks at Ryan when he shows up with the rest of the crew at the arranged meeting time. 

“Vagabond,” he greets, hands in his pockets as he rocks on his heels. “Glad to see you accepted the invitation. Hope you weren't waiting long.”

Ryan tilts his head to the side, eyes flicking to the man in the leather jacket just behind Geoff's shoulder. Expression neutral, but there's a lot going on in his eyes as he looks back at Ryan.

“Not long, no,” Ryan says, because two can play this game.

“Good, good,” Ramsey says. “Safe to say you know who I am. The man with the incredible beard is Jack, and to my left is Michael.”

Jack Patillo's beard is quite stunning, and the feature that seems to come up most often in all the stories about him Ryan's heard. Michael gives a short, sharp nod of acknowledgment when Ryan glances at him.

Geoff scratches his chin, eyes sliding towards the windows set up high in the side of the warehouse towards the spot Ray's camped. Smirk sliding into a smile, open and friendly and something like a trap when his gaze lands back on Ryan.

“Ray's out on a job at the moment, but I'm sure you two will meet soon.”

Right, sure. 

“And of course,” Geoff says, in a voice that says _we're all friends here, aren't we, Vagabond?_, “you already know Gavin.”

Gavin smiles at Ryan, small and crooked. 

“Hello, Vagabond.”

There's a slight hesitation in there. Gavin stumbling over the 'Vagabond' just enough for Geoff and the others to notice, wonder why that might be.

Ryan rolls his eyes, and says, “Hello, Gavin.”

Geoff's eyeing Gavin, who just looks back helplessly back at him, and sighs. “Yeah, we're gonna be having a talk about _that_ soon, buddy, believe you me.”

Gavin winces, dropping back next to Michael who moves to put himself just slightly in front of Gavin, something like a challenge in the way he cocks his head at Ryan.

Geoff's eyes flit between them, calm, calculating, and Ryan ignores that little voice in the back of his head again. Forces himself into stillness when Geoff locks eyes with him.

“All right, then,” Ramsey says, clapping his hands like a schoolteacher calling his students to attention. “As fun as this has been, what do you say we get down to business?”

========

Michael Jones is not Ryan's biggest fan.

And honestly, it's understandable. The first time they met – if you want to call it that - Ryan had a gun to his best friend's head. Not really a good first impression, all told.

Ryan's been working with the Fakes on and off for a few weeks, long enough that he's stopped looking for the catch. Stopped expecting them to turn on him, which is when Michael finally confronts him.

Ryan looks up from where he's cleaning his guns to see Michael drop into the chair across from him with an intent look on his face that makes Ryan instantly wary.

He usually doesn't spend much time at the penthouse but it's a slow day, rain coming down steadily outside. He took his bike in the night before and doesn't feel like making the ride back out to Gavin's place in this weather.

“You and Gavin,” Michael says. “What's that about?”

Ryan sets his gun down. Looks at Michael, who's waiting for an answer, so very patient.

And Ryan - 

He likes Michael. Likes his blunt honesty and the way he doesn't shy away from voicing his opinion, even if it's in opposition to Geoff's. Likes the way he looks after the crew, steady and loyal and unflinching.

“Breaking and entering, mostly,” Ryan says, which is the absolute truth. Hell if he knows how to explain everything else that's happened since the first time Gavin broke into his apartment.

“You put a gun to his head,” Michael says, and there's tightly leashed anger in his voice as he leans forward, hands coming up to rest on the table. Something else in his eyes that looks a lot like worry.

Ryan breathes out, slow and even and meets Michael's eyes. “I did, yes.”

No lying about it since Michael was the one who caught him at it. Bursting into the room with his gun coming to bear on Ryan in the moments before Gavin called out to him, before Ryan ran.

“Everyone seems all too happy to pretend that didn't happen,” Michael says, like he can't believe how stupid the others are. “_Gavin_ acts like it never happened, he's so goddamned thrilled you're working with us, but I fucking remember.”

Michael never raises his voice, doesn't need to.

“You don't think -” Michael says, pausing to clear his throat, “You don't think that's a little fucked up, considering?”

Ryan winces because Michael has a point, doesn't he. Couldn't have known at the time that Ryan never intended to kill Gavin, not when Ryan has that reputation of his. Can't know now that he would never do it.

And it's not like either he or Gavin have been particularly careful about the fact Ryan stays at his place. Haven't gone out of their way to hide it, when there's no real reason to anymore. Roomies and all.

“It's complicated.”

Michael's fingers curl inwards. Not quite forming fists, but certainly getting there.

“'Complicated',” Michael says, doing an admirable impression of Ryan. “The fuck, Vagabond. This isn't fucking _Lifeinvader_.”

“Thank God for that,” Ryan says, because he's still an idiot after all these years. “Can you imagine the drama we'd have to deal with if it was?”

Michael's eyes narrow as he pushes back from the table and stalks off.

Watching him, Ryan's fairly certain he's ruined whatever small progress he's made towards Michael not declaring himself Ryan's enemy for life. 

May have, actually, gotten him started on the path to becoming Ryan's arch nemesis instead.

Yikes.

========

“Oh, Ryan. You poor, dumb bastard,” Gavin says pityingly when Ryan tells him, which. 

Nice. 

“Yes, thank you,” Ryan says. “That's very helpful, Gavin. I'll be sure to remember that when your bestie kills me.”

Gavin _pshaws_ him, hand curling around Ryan's arm to pull him onto the couch, scattering the Edgars and Cat in the process. “Please, Ryan. Michael's not my bestie, he's my _boi_”

Ryan goes dead weight on Gavin, ignoring his protests, bony little fingers poking and prodding his shoulders and back insistently trying to get Ryan to bloody move, he weighs a ton at least.

“Ah, yes. My bad, Gavin. Thank you for correcting me.”

There's a minute of blessed silence, Gavin struggling fruitlessly to get free, when suddenly he sighs.

“You're making a mess of it with Michael,” he says, as though Ryan was unaware. After a slight pause, “Trust me, you don't want to be on Michael's bad side.”

As if Ryan hadn't figured that out for himself, given Michael's temper and skill with explosives and whatnot.

Ryan takes pity on Gavin and moves aside to let him up, and Gavin leans against him.

“He's sneaky,” Gavin mutters, sounding not unlike a small child complaining that something's unfair. “And patient.”

Ryan looks up at the ceiling, fighting a smile.

“Shut up,” Gavin says, sharp elbow meeting Ryan's side. “You don't understand, Ryan, he's horrible!”

Oh, Ryan doesn't doubt it. 

Michael may claim not to be as smart as the others in the crew. May toss out self-deprecating comments here and there, but he's sharp, clever. Wouldn't have survived on his own as long as he did before Geoff snapped him up for the Fakes if he wasn't.

“Sounds like you're speaking from personal experience.”

Gavin makes a face, shoulders hunching. “There, ah. May have been an incident or two when we first met.”

Knowing Gavin, Ryan's not really surprised by that. Really, really not surprised.

========

Apparently Geoff's the kind of person who believes in the sink-or-swim school of thought when it comes to interpersonal relationships. 

Decides the only way to get things sorted out is to send Ryan and Michael out on jobs together until they either kill each other or – in Geoff's words “kiss and makeup”, either or, he doesn't give a shit.

“Figure it out, assholes,” Geoff says, when Michael tries to argue with him over it yet again. “I don't have the time or patience to hold your hands through this middle school shit you have going on.”

Michael looks furious, but all he does is nod. Short, sharp, before he makes his way own to the garage, leaving Ryan alone with Geoff.

Geoff whose smile goes cold, sharp as he leans forward, words not so much a threat as the promise of one if Ryan fucks up.

“For the record, Vagabond? Michael's not the only one who remembers what you did. You're lucky Gavin's on your side, or you wouldn't be here right now. Don't forget that.”

* * *

There were going to be ~bonding scenes where Michael and Geoff want to kill Ryan a little less with their brain. Jack proves himself to be a bastard, and Ray laughs at everyone? Also, Jeremy was going to be introduced, and Ryan learned to fear Team Loser when Lindsay sweeps back into town after a job with the Roosters or something? (All I know is he learned what True Fear is when Gavin and Lindsay team up.)


	2. FAHC Myansay Shenanigans

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Based on a [not!fic](https://archiveofourown.org/works/13666224/chapters/41738252).

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My laptop crashed taking several revisions/scenes with it that killed my motivation to keep writing this. (Scenes to flesh out other sections I felt needed more *flaily hands* stuff to make the story flow smoother/not feel so flip/abrupt/many other reasons I wasn't thrilled with this version before adding said scenes, and when I lost them I was just /o\ and a little ;_; because they were rough for me to write.)
> 
> Early-draft nonsense that's super rough around the edges and choppy as hell as my ~writing process is a goddamned mess. For real, though. I warned y'all.)

Ryan should have learned his lesson the first time he did a favor for Meg.

========

“Oh, come on, Ryan,” she says, this very distinct note to her voice that says she thinks she’s going to get her way. “Gav’s an old friend of mine and his crew could use the help.”

Instead of Ryan doing a favor for a friend, he’s going to be doing a favor for a friend who’s doing a favor for a friend.

Fantastic.

Definitely no way this end badly for anyone involved.

“I’d do it myself but Mariel and Tyler are waiting for me in Europe and I don’t know if we’ll be back stateside in time.”

There’s a wheedle in her voice, subtle as hell but still there. Banking on old favors owed and the way Ryan’s always been easy for her. 

“Meg - “

“You’re not on a job at that moment are you?” she asks, as if she didn’t take the time to check before calling him. Wanted to make sure she had all possible bases covered if he tried to weasel his way out of things because she’s smart like that.

“I’m not,” Ryan says slowly, because he finished one just the other day.

Messy, ugly thing that took him out of Los Santos longer than he expected and now there’s an odd sort of energy humming along his bones. Restless, anxious, wholly at odds with the uniquely chaotic energy that runs through Los Santos, alive in a way few cities are, and it’s unsettling.

“The pay is good, and I promise you won’t regret it,” Meg says, because he’s never heard that before, and mutters something that sounds worryingly like _much anyway_ before she clears her throat and continues speaking.. “Besides, it’ll be fun.”

Ryan’s heard that one before too, usually before things go wrong in spectacular ways.

However.

His apartment is too quiet, too still, for the itch under his skin and Meg’s never steered him wrong when it counts.

“Alright,” he says, lips curving into a smile as Meg lets out a delighted whoop of victory. “Give me the details.”

========

Ryan’s heard a lot about Ramsey’s Golden Boy.

He’s not much to look at really, seems more flash than substance with his on-trend hair and gaudy gold-framed sunglasses. Designer clothes and the fake smile he gifts Ryan with when he spots him.

Waggles his fingers in a little wave as he makes his way through the clusters of people between them, snatching a drink off a server’s platter without being noticed as he takes the open seat in front of Ryan.

“Sorry I’m late,” he says, plucking the little paper umbrella out of his stolen drink. “Los Santos traffic is simply dreadful.”

Ryan stares at him, letting his mask and reputation do the work for him as Ramsey's Golden Boy smiles, and smiles and _smiles_ at him. Takes this delicate little sip and the facade finally cracks as he makes a face, sets the drink down on the table and pushes it away from him.

“Oh, God,” he mutters, reaching up to push the sunglasses in his hair. “That’s just foul.”

He’s making a face like a kid who’s gotten hold of something he shouldn’t have, or dipping into their parents’ liquor cabinet and come up against something he didn’t expect.

“It’s what you get for stealing someone else’s drink”, Ryan says, his own facade breaking because the Vagabond doesn’t _do_ this. 

Doesn’t tease or joke or laugh at someone getting their comeuppance in such a small way like this, no. 

He’s one of Los Santos’ bogeymen who gets hired to make someone’s worst nightmare come true and whatever else they have to say about him, not...this.

Gavin – because surely that’s who's giving him this quietly delighted look and not Ramsey’s Golden Boy – laughs.

“Oh,” he says, this grin spreading on his face that Ryan’s not sure he likes. “Oh, you’re just lovely, aren't you?”

========

Ryan doesn’t carry a lot of regrets with him. 

Can’t afford to, given what he does for a living, but there a few that have stuck with him over the years.

Words spoken in anger he never got the chance to take back. 

Things left undone, unsaid. 

This life that he’s chose, or had chosen for him.

But for all that, they’re small regrets in the grand scheme of things. Content to stay in the back reaches of his mind, quiet aching things for long, lonely nights when he’s at his lowest.

In all his life, there have only been two that refuse to stay buried.

Too new, perhaps. Fresh wounds that still sting after all this time, and always something to tear them open again.

But now?

Ryan regrets everything. 

He regrets taking Meg’s phone call, to agreeing to meet with her Gavin and the job offer he had for him.

Regrets that slight moment of indecision on his part that allowed Gavin to dive in with a grin on his face to sell Ryan on the idea of working with the Fake AH Crew on their latest heist. The money he stood to make from it and more where that came from if he decided he liked working with them enough to join the crew full-time. (The way his smile softened, voice going quiet when he told Ryan there would be no hard feelings if he decided joining the crew wasn’t his style, like he knew anything about it.)

He regrets the one that got away, so to speak, because Ryan knew it was the smart thing to do for both their sakes. (He regrets having to learn that lesson all over again not too long afterwards because his heart is dumb as shit.)

“What? Is there something on my face?”

Ryan almost laughs at the annoyance to the question, the snap of anger to it because it’s so damned familiar.

It’s been years since he’s seen Michael. Two? Three? Maybe longer, and he hasn’t changed all that much since then. Still has that anger to him that threatened to burst into an uncontrollable blaze with the right provocation, but it’s banked now. Low simmer in the back of his eyes and this snap and snarl to him with no real bite.

Which is the height of irony with the way Michael’s scowling at him. This look to him like the only thing keeping him from getting up in Ryan’s face about the unintentional staring he must have been doing is the hand on his shoulder.

“Calm down boy,” and God, the amusement to those words is just as achingly familiar. “Sit. Heel.”

Lindsay’s grinning as she says them, like she knows she’s immune from his anger or just doesn’t care about the potential fallout.

She’s always been like that, to be honest. Dangerously reckless and unpredictable as shit and it’s been even longer since he’s seen her. Thought she might have left the business altogether when he stopped hearing about the shit she got up to, things only she’d manage to pull off that had the cops scratching their heads at the sheer impossibility of it all.

Michael’s scowl shifts to a full-on glare as he looks at Lindsay, but he doesn’t knock her hand off his shoulder. Doesn’t move to put space between them or seem particularly bothered by the way she just keeps smiling in the face of his annoyance.

There’s a whole lot of history there, and if Ryan had known these two would be part of this whole...favor of a favor thing going on in his life, he would have reconsidered everything.

(Everything.)

As it is, he’s grateful for the fact Michael and Lindsay haven’t seemed to recognize him yet, although he’s sure it’s only a matter of time before they figure it out. 

It’s - 

“Jesus dicks,” someone says, sounding as though his life is nothing but endless suffering. “Could you two keep your weird idea of foreplay in the bedroom where it belongs?”

Ryan blinks at that, confused at the hint of color that seeps into Michael's cheeks at that, the tops of his ears, and the way Lindsay starts _cackling_. Leans in to brush a kiss to Michael’s cheek that he doesn’t fight, even though he sends a dark look her way.

Sees the ring on her finger, understated diamond set in a white-gold ring and the matching band on Michael’s hand.

_Oh,_ he thinks, pieces clicking into place as he watches the two of them. Easy touches and Lindsay’s delighted grin complementing the not-really-a-scowl-because-you’d-know-if-it-was-real on Michael’s face. The way he’s unconsciously leaning towards her, warmth in his eyes when he glances at her. _Well that’s unexpected._

Ryan doesn’t know what he’s feeling as he stares at the two of them, memories colliding in the present and turning into this glorious shitshow of incredible coincidences and worst possible timing. (Niggling regrets he quashes ruthlessly because he missed his chance. Chances, and no time to think about that now, is there.)

“Fuck off, Geoff!” Michael snaps, sliding off the stool he’s been sitting in to confront the owner of the voice directly. 

Ryan blinks, attention pulled to the figure walking into the room, sharply tailored suit and iconic mustache and shakes off his distractions to focus.

He’d known, going in, that he’ll be answering to Geoff Ramsey, Los Santos’ notorious Kingpin, and yet?

“Geoffrey!” Gavin chirps, leaning over the counter where he’s been fussing with the bowl of fruit and eyeing up the fancy blender in the corner. “You’re awake! Fantastic, I have someone for you to meet!”

Ramsey rolls his eyes, fond little quirk to his mouth as he looks over at Gavin, and does a double-take when he sees Ryan.

“Gavin,” he says slowly, warning in his his voice. “What the hell did you do this time?”

Gavin affects a _who, me?_ pose that’s almost convincing until he ruins it with an obnoxiously wide grin and smug little laugh.

“Oh, you mean him?” he asks, gesturing at Ryan. “You asked me to get us more people for the heist, remember? And since I don’t think you wanted another Caleb incident, I asked Meg if she knew anyone who’d be a good fit for the job.”

There’s an instant reaction to the mention of this Caleb. Michael’s scowl deepening and Lindsay’s usual cheer replaced with one to match. Gavin’s grip on the apple he’s holding tightens until he bruises it, fingers digging into the flesh hard enough to leave marks. Even Ramsey reacts, expression darkening as me mutters the name under his breath.

Ryan’s seen reactions like that before, usually having to do with double-crosses and backstabbers someone thought they could trust, but the alarming difference here is how quickly it passes.

Blink of an eye kind of thing, and then everyone’s back to what Ryan is hesitant to call normal, because he’s getting the feeling he’s gotten himself into something far from that, but - 

“Yes, Gavin,” Ramsey says, clearly mocking Gavin with that horrible faux British accent. “Him.”

Ryan should be offended by this, the way the two of them are talking about him like he’s not in the room. Like someone with his kind of reputation wouldn’t be insulted by it, but it’s oddly entertaining.

He’s heard about Ramsey likely the same way the man’s heard about him. Word of mouth and all those rumors floating around the city. People who’ve had the luck – good or bad, depending on who’s perspective you’re viewing things – to run into him at some point.

The Kingpin’s history with the Roosters that led him to Los Santos, reasons and motivations for that decision lost in the telling for those not in the know. 

A falling out between the Founders, difference of opinion. Famous face to distract from the Roosters making a play for Los Santos under the guise of a new crew to throw the authorities off. Goddamned whimsy from someone with nothing to lose and a criminal empire backing him up. An easy dozen other theories why Ramsey chose to set up shop in Los Santos.

Gavin laughs again, claps a hand on Ryan's shoulder like they’re old friends and not complete strangers who met in a dingy bar a few hours ago.

Says, easy as anything, “Meg vouches for him.”

Which, you know.

Meg is a goddamned lunatic in her own right and not someone you should go around trusting blindly. And yet? There are all these idiots (Ryan should count himself as one of them, if he’s being honest) who do because she’s _Meg_, and hell if Ryan knows when that became its own qualification, but it seems to work for this bunch as well, because Ramsey just sighs at Gavin’s declaration.

Gives Ryan this once-over like he wants a nice little mental snapshot of the next biggest mistake and shakes his head.

“Oh, well. If _Meg_ says he’s alright I guess that makes everything okay,” he says, and grabs the apple out of Gavin’s hand and sets it back into the decorative fruit bowl. “And stop fucking with my fruit, asshole.”

Ryan...is pretty sure he’s going to regret this for a long time to come.

========

There’s no official contract for what Ryan’s doing when it comes to the Fake AH Crew.

Technically he’s here to fill out their numbers for this heist they’ve got planned to go go off a few months down the line.

Another gun, hired muscle to help with the heist prep and pull the damn heist off successfully when the time comes, but until then?

He gets bounced around helping out here and there with whatever problems pop up.

Sometimes that means he spends an awkward amount of time with Michael playing heavies to back Gavin or Geoff up in negotiations. Sometimes that means going with Lindsay to check up on what the crew’s B-Team has been up to.

He’s keenly aware of Geoff and Jack keeping an eye on him to make sure he’s playing nice with the others. Which, by the way, Ryan does because he’s not that much of an idiot, but he didn’t expect them to pick up on the tension between Ryan and the Jones’. 

Ryan didn’t think it was noticeable, hoped to pass it off as part and parcel of the whole Vagabond deal, being cool and aloof and typical loner nonsense, but Ryan’s kind of dumb, isn’t he?

Doesn’t act like that around Gavin because Gavin doesn’t let him. Pushes and prods and bombards him with these ridiculous hypothetical questions that are an affront to science and logic and God knows what else, and just.

He’s an idiot, and it shows. 

Has Geoff throwing him together with Gavin more and more and claiming Michael and the others are busy handling other situations and suck it up, new guy, you get babysitting duty.

He’s still marveling at the way Gavin is proving to be this annoying thorn in his side in all the way Ryan _isn’t_ annoyed with him. (Most of the time, anyway.)

Considering everything he’d heard about him prior to this, everything his crew has had to say about things in regards to him (always with this tinge of fondness and slight confusion like even they don’t know how he does it) it’s a surprise Ryan likes him as much as he does.

It’s certainly not the worst thing ever since it allows Ryan time to adjust to running into Michael and Lindsay and slowly – goddamn so slowly – coming to terms with the mistakes he made there and getting past them. (Again, it’s slow going, but he hopes to get there one day.)

Probably makes him seem even more suspicious to Michael, Lindsay, the way he gets along with Gavin and the others and barely says a word to them if he can help it. (They know his voice, even if they don’t seem to have recognized it just yet.)

It feels like another misstep he’s making, staying with the crew, so close to them, even though he can’t explain why. (His dumb, stupid heart and the way they’re obviously perfect for one another and those regrets of his.)

“Ryan?”

Ryan looks up, sees Gavin standing just inside the living room watching him warily.

“I - “ Gavin stops himself, fiddles with his ridiculous sunglasses. “Is this a bad time?”

Even if it was, something about the way Gavin’s acting is reason for concern. Nervous, anxious. Unlike the person Ryan’s gotten to know over the last few weeks.

“No,” Ryan says. “Did you need something?”

Gavin laughs, scrubbing a hand over his face as he comes closer, perches on the arm of the couch Ryan’s sitting on.

“You could say that,” he mumbles, rubbing at a faded scar on his neck. “There’s. I’ve got a problem I could use some help with? If you don’t mind, that is.”

Ryan glances around at the whole lot of nothing he has going on at the moment.

“I’m all ears,” he says, and smiles at the awkward laugh it gets from Gavin.

“Ryan, that’s – What does that even mean?” Gavin asks, immediately derailed, and Ryan bites back a grin as Gavin slides down to sit on the couch like a civilized human being as he puzzles that particular saying out.

Whatever Gavin’s problem is, it sounds like it’s going to take a while for him to circle back around to, but it’s fine because Ryan’s got the time for it.

========

So, the thing is.

The thing is, Ryan doesn’t remember why he started wearing the mask. It probably seemed like a good idea at the time, way back when. (He knows, though. He knows.)

Holdover from the days when life was simpler (funny how people say that, like life’s ever simple, but that perspective thing again) and he didn’t have to worry about people out to kill him. Could just amble down the street like anyone else and pop into the corner grocery store or wherever he was headed without worrying about the consequences of it.

Picked it up at that shop along Vespucci one day because he was feeling whimsical, liked the look of the dumb black skull mask because of course he did. 

Wore it as a joke, and it stuck and after he had the means he looked into getting something that offered a little more protection than a cheap Halloween costume mask. (Got tired of having to replace it every time one got torn up on a job or wore out on him when his luck was good and things were going his way. No new injuries or scars to add to his collection.)

Talked to a guy who knew a guy who knew someone who could make him one with armor to it, light and flexible enough it wouldn’t be a hindrance.

He knows why he started wearing the face paint under it, because Meg and a job that didn’t go the way it was supposed to, and did he mention Meg?

Because that was a whole thing, back in the day.

The two of them and the asshole client who neglected to mention he was pitting them against one another to see which of them was the better killer. Little test of his he didn’t tell either of them about for the hell of it.

Just gave them what information he had on the target and good hunting and Ryan flat on his back on a roof with a knife in his side and Meg glaring down at him, another knife against his throat.

All, _”Back off, asshole, that fucker’s mine.”_ and the confusion that followed as they figured out what was going on and decided to tip the target off instead of finishing the job they were given. Paid their client a visit, let him know they didn’t appreciate people playing games like that with them, and Meg giving him the name of someone who could get him better body armor for a decent price.

No apology for the new scar she gave him, but considering she could have killed him he likes to think he got off easy.

They kept bumping into one another after that, happenstance and coincidences that weren’t, and an idle comment from her when someone asshole got Ryan’s mask off before he died.

This moment hanging between them where she could have done anything, and instead offered him a bit of advice. Crooked smile on her face and offhand comment of, _”Well if you’re going to be dramatic about it, why not go all out?”_

“Wait,” Gavin says, choking on his drink. Some ridiculous brightly colored cocktail with a fruit garnish and little paper umbrella because it’s fun, Ryan, don’t be such a wet bag. “You do the whole face paint thing because Meg told you to?”

Like Gavin wouldn’t have done the same in his shoes. Like he doesn’t do the same now.

“I mean,” Ryan says, and shrugs. It’s Meg. “What would you have done?”

It should feel stranger than it does sharing this part of himself with Gavin, but he has the benefit of being someone Meg speaks highly of. Someone she trusts implicitly, and that’s a rare thing in their line of work.

That, and there’s just something about Gavin that bypasses all the little barriers Ryan puts between himself and other people. Slips past like they’re not even there and doesn’t seem to notice. (It would be more worrying if Gavin wasn’t so goddamned _Gavin_ about it.)

Gavin’s on his third – fourth? - drink and well past tipsy. Or would be, if this wasn’t a job and the bartender making their drinks wasn’t on the crew payroll. Someone from B-Team Gavin’s been flirting with off and on, insisting it’s the perfect ploy.

Making Ryan jealous to ramp up the drama and make the whole situation a bit more interesting, give their VIP in the audience a real show.

And Ryan?

He’s not sure if Gavin’s logic on the matter is sound or not, doesn’t even want to delve into that bit of nonsense to try and unravel his meaning because he’s sure it won’t be worth it in the end. Best leave it alone and all.

Ryan’s not wearing the mask at the moment because Halloween’s right around the corner and no one’s going to look twice at someone getting into the festive mood a little early. He’s changed up the design a little though, gone for something less Vagabond and more...normal.

Detailed enough to make him make him unrecognizable to anyone who sees him, but he still feels vulnerable without his usual attire.

A few tables over a guy’s watching the two of them, watching _Gavin_, who as it happens _is_ wearing his usual attire as Ramsey’s Golden Boy. 

Ostentatious as hell and leaning hard on Ryan as they talk, empty glasses on the table and prime target ripe for the plucking. (Some mixed metaphors in there, but the meaning’s the same.)

The problem Gavin came to him about earlier. Someone from Gavin’s past with a grudge against Gavin and something to the way he says it that makes Ryan think it’s more of a mutual thing. (This hardness to the look on Gavin’s face, smile that didn't reach his eyes.)

Members of the crew are sprinkled around them in case things get complicated, turn ugly, while the two of them play bait.

“Fair play,” Gavin says, and laughs as he plays up the ‘well past tipsy’ side of things and laughs a little too loud, presses against Ryan a little more. “What do you say we get this little show on the road, hmm?”

Ryan looks down at him, little idiot who’s had too much to drink hanging off his arm candy for the night and vulnerable as hell. 

It makes something clench in his chest. Worry, concern, _feelings_ the Vagabond isn’t supposed to have because they’re weaknesses to be used against him in this line of work. Why he doesn’t work with a crew, plays lone wolf where everyone can see because it’s safer. (Acquaintances are fine, sure, but friends? Something more? Death sentences.)

And then Gavin winks at him, cheeky little thing with sharp edges and Ryan swallows back a laugh because he’s learned better in the short time he’s been with the crew.

Gavin wouldn't be here if he wasn’t capable of being as ruthless and cutthroat as the others, as Ryan himself. Wouldn’t have made it as far as he has, gotten a coveted place in one of Los Santos’ most notorious crews.

“Sure,” he says, sliding a few bills under his glass. “Why not.”

They pass by a table in the corner where Michael and Lindsay are chatting. Lovely little couple out on a date and Ryan’s steps falter just the tiniest bit at the thought, or maybe it’s just Gavin’s stumbling steps and hiccuping laugh as he clings to Ryan as they shuffle along.

========

They’re halfway down the alley when the tail they picked up makes himself known.

Snarls out a, “Hey, Free! Remember me, you bastard?” as though they don’t know he’s been watching them all night.

Gavin twists around in Ryan’s hold, shiny gold-plated gun in his hand and this vicious little grin on his face.

“Oh, Richie,” he says, and that’s _anger_ in his voice, real and dark and so cold it burns under the playful tone that it startles Ryan. “Of course I do.”

There’s a moment, a pause, as Richie’s brain tries to process the shift between sloppy drunk Gavin and the wolf staring him down - 

And then Gavin fires.

Single shot that catches Richie in the throat, hands flying to the wound and fluttering helplessly as he tries to stop the bleeding, do whatever he can to hold onto life a little longer.

Gavin untangles himself from Ryan and stalks over to Richie who drops to his knees as he chokes on his own blood. 

“Should have stayed in England,” Gavin says. “You might have lived longer.”

Another gunshot and Richie’s body topples over, just like that

Gavin stares at it for a long moment, silent and still.

Doesn’t react when Ryan calls his name, takes a step towards him. 

They both look up at the sound of the door to the bar’s back entrance opening and Michael and Lindsay come out to join them.

Ryan stands there uselessly as Michael goes up to Gavin, eases the gun out of his hold and slips it to Lindsay who steps back to let the others know the job’s done.

Voice soft as he wraps a hand around the back of Gavin’s neck and pulls him in for a hug, and Lindsay catches Ryan’s eye. Jerks her head towards the bar and follows her inside to give Gavin and Michael privacy.

========

“There was a Thing,” Lindsay says, as they claim a seat at the bar. “Before Gavin joined the crew. Used to run with a friend of his in England, you know? Stupid assholes, both of them.”

Ryan watches as she calls the bartender over, orders a drink for herself and shrugs when Ryan tells her he doesn’t drink.

“No skin off my nose, buddy,” she says cheerfully. “But, uh. Yeah.”

There’s a moment of silence as she toys with a coaster in front of her as she waits for her order, spins it in wide circles.

“That asshole in the alley tried to get one over on them. Gavin doesn’t talk about it, but it got messy. Dan got shot and Gavin got scared, likes to joke about running away from home after that.” Lindsay laughs, like it’s something to laugh about, but her heart’s not in it. “Came to America and did fuckall until Burnie and Geoff picked him up somewhere, and the rest is history.

She looks up when the bartender comes over with her drink and tosses back a quarter of it, coughing and gasping as her eyes water.

“Fuck, that’s strong,” she mutters, shrugging at the look Ryan gives her. “Everyone’s fine now, obviously, except for the asshole, I mean.”

There’s...a lot missing to the story, but Ryan’s just hired muscle to her. 

Someone Gavin might like enough to ask to for help the way he did, which is why she gives him as much as she does by way of explanation. Other than that he’s no one to her and that’s the way he wants (needs) things to stay.

“Do me a favor?” Lindsay asks, staring at her drink, this ghost of a smile on her face Ryan doesn’t recognize. “Look after him for us, okay? He’s a little shit, but he’s our little shit.”

Ryan doesn’t know why she’s asking him, of all people, but since he was planning on it anyway - 

“I can do that,” he says.

Lindsay laughs and thumps Ryan on the shoulder, “Good man,” she says, unaware of how far from the truth that is.

========

Ryan likes to think he’s done a good job of avoiding being caught alone with Michael and Lindsay since he signed on for the heist.

And the few times he has, he’s taken care to stick with short answers and vague gestures where possible. They don’t know he’s the Vagabond, but they know his face and damn sure they know what his voice sounds like even if it’s been years since they’ve spoken.

Best not to tempt fate and however else that goes, even though he’s doing exactly that by not just fucking _leaving_ when he had the chance.

He’s not tempting fate so much now as as he’s double-dog daring it to bite him in the ass. 

Not that he knows what will happen when they realize who he is, but he’s betting it won’t be pretty on their part or Ramsey’s with as long as he’s let things go like this.

Could have been one of those awkward moments in life that happen sometime, both of them realizing the new hire is someone they’d met at a bar that one time and happened to take home. Independently of one another and wow, talk about your weird coincidences, you know? (Ha, ha, ha.)

Just fucking wild how that works, and what are the odd the two of them would meet and get happily – almost sickeningly so at times – married and live a life of crime together

(There is no LifeInvader status that even begins to cover how damn complicated the relationship between the three of them is.)

At first it was all-over awkward for Ryan being in the same room as them because his dumb heart that’s never known what it wants and their obvious happiness and just. 

A lot of things, really.

But as time passed it’s just gotten harder and harder to even think about telling them, trying to imagine what their reactions would be when they find out.

So.

Like the coward he is, Ryan runs at every given opportunity. Uses the flimsiest excuses and everything in his arsenal to avoid them whenever he can get away with it.

Obvious as hell, but thankfully everyone seems to think it’s just one of those Vagabond things, which works for longer than Ryan expects it would.

But eventually Michael has enough of Ryan fleeing the room anytime it looks like they’re going to breathing the same air for any length of time because he deliberately seeks him out.

Catches Ryan when he’s in the middle of cleaning his weapons at the penthouse one morning. Got there early because Ramsey has a job for him later and he...didn’t have a lot going on anyway, so there’s that he guesses.

Ryan can’t tell if Michael's become paranoid or if he’s just noticing it more now that he’s on edge and feeling paranoid around Michael and Lindsay.

Although, to be fair, it’s not as though Michael had reason to be suspicious of Ryan before. Different circumstances and Michael being the one scrambling to hide his secrets because Ryan’s always been a bit of a bastard like that. (Let him think the guy he met at the bar that first night was just an average civilian, nothing interesting to him at all.)

“Something wrong?” Ryan asks, like someone sharpening the – admittedly – unnecessarily large array of knives they carry on their person at the kitchen table isn’t reason for concern.

It’s been a couple of weeks since the incident at the bar and Ryan’s starting to get a feel for the everyday chaos commonplace with the crew. Random chaos brought about by someone in the crew and the shit they get up to or just the way things happen in Los Santos.

Michael grunts before knocking back the last of his coffee long gone cold and stabbing a finger at Ryan.

“You fucking hurt him, you’re gonna have to answer to me,” he says, confusing the hell out of Ryan because he doesn’t know who he’s talking about.

Just to make matters doubly confusing, Lindsay walks into the kitchen with a matching scowl on her face.

“And me, asshole!” she cries, one hundred percent supportive of Michael's threat without knowing the motivation behind it because solidarity probably.

(Lindsay’s reason and logic are her own and no one, _no one_, will ever understand either.)

Michael sighs, eyes closing briefly before he turns to face Lindsay.

“What the fuck are you doing?” he demands, and this is familiar too. 

That rough anger a thin facade of helpless amusement and fondness and Ryan fumbles his knife, old trusted friend that it is, and hisses softly as he opens up a cut along his thumb. He stares at it for a moment because it’s been a long damn time since he’s done something so stupid, and hopes it’s gone unnoticed by the others.

But with his luck - 

“Jesus,” Lindsay says, eyebrows raised as she watches him wipe the blood away to assess the damage. “That, uh. _Wow_.”

Michael snaps back around like he was expecting Ryan to stab him in the back the moment it was turned (and that hurts more than the sharp sting of the cut), expression echoing Lindsay’s when he sees what a mess Ryan’s made of himself this time.

“Christ,” he mutters. And, “Thought you were supposed to be good with those things?”

Ryan’s brain is operating on some kind of delay, belated realization he should have packed his knives up and gone somewhere – anywhere – else the moment Michael planted himself across from him.

“I - “

There’s a commotion in the doorway and then Gavin’s fluttering his way over, wide eyes and a washcloth he’s picked up from somewhere he wraps around Ryan’s hand, his thumb. Presses down hard, sharp brutal flare of pain that kicks Ryan out of human disaster panic and back into rational(ish) thought.

“Jesus, Vagabond,” he says, worry and concern and this little flare of anger powered by incredulousness. “Don’t just sit there and bleed, you idiot. We eat here!”

That - 

Not the most touching or heartfelt sentiment, but it has Ryan allowing Gavin to keep his hold on him as he drags him out of his chair and towards the bathroom where they keep the first-aide kit for injuries short of a non life-threatening emergency.

He glances back as he hears a derisive snort to see Michael watching them, downturn to his mouth that Ryan doesn’t understand until Gavin tugs on his hand to keep him moving. Looks at Gavin with all that worry and concern and hands wrapped around Ryan’s and chokes back a laugh when he finally realizes what the threats are all about because his life turned into a fucking soap opera when he wasn’t looking.

========

“Have you ever been in love?”

Ryan blinks, lowering his binoculars to look at Gavin.

They’re supposed to break into an office to steal files for Gavin and Matt to play with, get the crew one step closer to pulling off the heist they were working on for months before bringing him on board.

Gavin’s been in a thoughtful frame of mind since the bar. More subdued, seeking Ryan out when the quiet he’s surrounded himself with gets to be too much. 

The others have been quick to take note of that, and Ryan’s been pulled aside more than once with warnings not to hurt Gavin that are just...Ryan doesn’t know.

Not laughable, certainly, because those warnings come from a place of care and concern, a worry for Gavin that Ryan’s relieved to see.

But they’re also a reason _for_ concern because as much as Ryan likes Gavin, he doesn’t – as the kids would say, _like_-like him, and he’s sure the feeling is mutual.

Ryan must have taken too long to answer because Gavin laughs nervously, turns his head down the block towards the party someone’s having. Thumping bass line and stobing lights casting strange shadows on the street outside.

“Never mind,” he says, hand scratching at the beard he’s growing out for a later prep phase. “Stupid thing to ask, yeah?”

It’s a simple enough out, way to change the subject and get Gavin prattling on about something else to pass the time, gloss over the awkward moment, but it feels wrong to do that. Not when Gavin’s reaching out in his own way, awkward and fumbling and painfully honest the way he gets sometimes.

“I...” Ryan says, and has to stop and think about it. How to phrase things so they make sense, and then laughs like he knows what the hell he’s talking about. “You really don’t ask the easy questions, do you?”

Gavin shrugs, lopsided grin on his face and this helpless little shrug.

“Once or twice,” Ryan settles on, thinking about the past and things that could have been _if only_.

Thinks about chance meetings in dingy little bars and the myth about lightning never striking twice in the same place. Reckless grins and careless eyebrows and his stupid, greedy heart and the kind of life not made for things it wants. (Stolen moments where he wasn’t his reputation and everything was easy, simple, and he could pretend for a little bit.)

Quickfire laughter and his heart tripping over itself when he realized he’d gotten in too deep. A different time and the same problem all over again with a throaty laugh and warm eyes and realizing he hadn’t learned his lesson the first time.

“I guess I have.”

Years and years ago and he thought he’d done a good job of forgetting, putting it all behind him until recently. (Harder to lie convincingly to yourself with your past mistakes staring you down.)

Maybe Gavin’s picked up on it, or something else happened to have him come to Ryan about this, Ryan doesn’t know.

“What makes you ask?”

Another little laugh, quiet little sigh.

“There’s...someone. Don’t think he’d ever think about me like that, though,” Gavin says, smile on his face that looks all wrong on him. Sad and resigned and trying not to let it show. “But it’s probably nothing? Silly little crush, probably.

Ryan hums, lets Gavin have the lie he so desperately wants as he spots movement in the house they’ve been watching for the last several hours. Sees their target head out for the clandestine meeting with they were told would be the perfect opportunity to get in and out without being seen.

“Looks like our guy’s on the move. You ready?”

Gavin snaps out of his melancholy and grabs the bag between his feet, shoots Ryan one of Ramsey’s Golden Boy’s smirks.

“Always,” he says, which is another damn lie Ryan lets him have because it’d make him one hell of a hypocrite if he didn’t.

========

There’s a snag, little hiccup in the crew’s plan for the heist and they pull one of the people from B-Team into the heist to balance things out.

Vaguely familiar and it takes a moment before Ryan places him as the bartender the Fakes put behind the bar to help with Gavin’s problem a while back. 

Scrappy little bastard who doesn’t seem fazed by Ryan wandering around the penthouse in all his Vagabond...Vagabond-ness. Just eyes him up for a moment before snorting, grin crossing his face as he asks if he can touch his mini-gun.

“I’m sorry?”

The guy laughs, big hearty thing for someone so short and grins at Ryan from underneath that ridiculous cowboy hat of his as he rocks on his heels.

Impertinent, is the first word that springs to mind as Ryan watches him warily. Aggravating is the second as he just keeps _grinning_. 

Reminds him of Gavin in the worst (best) way, and something more to it as well, a confidence Gavin lacks unless he’s put on the armor of being Ramsey’s Golden Boy, virtually untouchable and all too aware of it.

“Jeremy!” Gavin yells as he walks in on their little tableau. He looks utterly delighted at seeing Jeremy. “Trevor told me he was sending you here but I didn’t think you’d be here so soon.”

Gavin is...he’s _glowing_, all smiles and excitement and more animated than Ryan’s seen him in a while. 

All but bounces over, words getting tangled up as Gavin babbles to Jeremy about the crew’s progress on the heist as though Jeremy wouldn’t know. (And it’s possible he doesn’t, but from what Ryan’s seen of Trevor and the B-Team he highly doubts it.)

Still, Jeremy just grins and lets Gavin bring him up to date, breaking in once or twice to tell him to slow down when Gavin flubs too badly to be understood, and it’s - 

It’s good to see Gavin closer to his normal again, bright and cheerful and this edge of mischief to everything he does. The way Jeremy leans in like he’s eager to hear everything Gavin has to say in a way that’s not just humoring him, and something to all of it that has Ryan wondering.

The timing is suspicious as hell, but what does Ryan know?

Ryan shakes his head and retreats to the living room while Gavin and Jeremy catch up and tries not to think too hard about things that aren’t his business.

========

Geoff takes to pairing Ryan and Jeremy up while Gavin and Matt sift through the files they stole, make sense of the information they have for the upcoming heist.

Sends them out to deal with problems that pop up here and there for the crew as well as any day-to-day business that needs a...less delicate touch.

There’s a lot of explosions in his life at the moment, is what Ryan’s saying.

A lot of explosions and property damage and Jeremy laughing at it all in a way that would be highly disturbing in anyone else, but with Jeremy?

Not so much.

Granted, half the time the explosions aren’t exactly warranted, but they sure are pretty.

Also? 

They don’t have to come back to give a second warning, which is always nice. Efficiency, or something like that.

“That’s...I wouldn’t call it that, buddy,” Geoff sighs, as he stares at the two of them back from their latest errand. “But good job, I guess?”

Jeremy’s a little singed, sure, but he was talking about getting a new cowboy hat anyway and the crew won’t have to worry about that particular gang in the future, so all’s well that ends well, as the saying goes.

(Ryan may be losing his mind, just the tiniest bit the longer he works with the Fakes, and he’s not so sure it’s a bad thing.)

“Go do something else where I don’t have to see you two assholes,” Geoff says, but he doesn’t sound angry about it so much as completely baffled by them and the horrible life choices involved in pairing the them up for just about anything. “Go, shoo.”

Jeremy slides Ryan a look, grin curling his mouth and Ryan can’t help his own grin because Geoff wasn’t specific about what he wants them to do, and the day is still young.

“No!” Geoff yells, catches himself when they look back at him and tries to compose himself. “No more exploding things for the rest of the week! Go do...quiet activities or something, just. Please, no more explosions or fires or whatever is going to have Trevor coming to me with complaints, alright? Please, I’m begging you.”

Well, since he asked so nicely.

“Sure thing, boss!” Jeremy says, all bright and cheerful and completely suspect. “Whatever you say!”

Jeremy's a goddamned menace and Geoff seems to be of the same mind because he gives Ryan a beseeching look which is a first.

“Alright, alright,” Ryan says, grabbing Jeremy by the arm to pull him out of Geoff’s office. “Stop terrorizing him. Didn’t you say there was something wrong with your car?”

Something or other about its engine making a disturbing rattling sound as he was running from the cops the other day and the crew’s mechanics being overloaded with work. General crew shenanigans and gentle re-purposing of the heist vehicles they’ve brought in over the last few weeks.

Ryan’s not an expert on cars, but he knows a thing or two, and he’s certainly qualified to hold a flashlight while Jeremy roots around trying to find the problem himself.

Ryan keeps a straight face when he hears a deeply relieved sigh as the door to Geoff’s office closes behind them, but Jeremy?

The little bastard cracks the hell up, wide grin and that same sort of bastard-ish mischief in his eyes Ryan’s used to seeing in Gavin's, which is its own kind of trouble.

========

It doesn’t take a detective to puzzle out there’s a definite _something_ between Gavin and Jeremy.

Not with the way Gavin acts whenever Jeremy’s around, so much more _him_ than Ryan’s seen before. 

Genuinely happy to have Jeremy’s attention focused on him and these soft little smiles for him when he thinks no one’s watching.

It’s.

Adorable, is what it is.

Helps draw Gavin out of that quiet, dark place he was in after the incident with Richie. Has hims grinning and thinking up trouble when he’s not working with Matt on the stolen files or some other problem someone brings them.

Ryan’s walked in on the two of them plotting and scheming several times over by now, always acting like kids getting caught out by an authority figure when he does. Shifty-eyed and muffled laughter and obvious as hell about it.

“Yeah,” Geoff sighs, when Ryan thinks to warn Geoff about their latest nefarious scheme, fond smile on his face. “Yeah, I know all about those two assholes. Oblivious as hell, both of them.”

And then the bastard slides a look at Ryan.

“Speaking of,” he says. “You good to work with Michael on something for me?”

Ryan grins and bears it as Geoff outlines a problem that’s been brought to his attention. Pesky asshole who’s been making trouble for one of the crew’s allies that would benefit from a visit from them.

Short and sweet job that shouldn’t take too long and if Geoff notices something off with Ryan as he agrees to it, he doesn’t say a damn word.

========

Gavin is running himself into the ground. Working around the clock to crack some bit of encryption that’s managed to stump both him and Matt and it’s getting to be a problem.

“You don’t say,” Ryan muses, watching Gavin stare blankly at his computer screen as Matt hovers by Ryan’s side. “I wouldn’t have thought.”

Matt throws him an unimpressed look, but it lacks its usual sting what with the dark bags under his eyes and all.

Ryan’s lips twitch, because Matt’s one of the few who’s never been impressed with Ryan or his reputation to start with. Doesn’t seem to impressed with much, if Ryan’s being honest. (Unflappable, or just apathetic, but that’s only surface deep because he’s as much as a horrible little bastard as Jeremy is. He’s just better at hiding it.)

“Go get some sleep,” Ryan says, because the shape he’s in he’ll be passed out on his keyboard soon enough. “I’ll take care of Gavin.”

Matt _hmms_, this touch of innuendo to it that turns into a laugh with a cough tacked onto the end of it when Ryan sends him a dark look.

“Okay, okay,” he says, hands out in a placating gesture. “Message received.”

Ryan rolls his eyes as Matt shuffles out of the room and calls Gavin’s name softly, trying not to startle him. (Bad idea for people like them.)

“Gavin, c’mon, buddy. Snap out of it,” Ryan says, louder the second time around, enough to annoy Gavin into indecipherable grumbling that has Ryan grinning in spite of himself. “You’re going to fuck up your back if you fall asleep in here.”

Eventually Gavin comes out of the daze he’s fallen into and looks around the room in confusion.

“Ryan?”

“Yeah, hey,” Ryan says. “Time to take a break, don’t you think?”

Gavin blinks owlishly at him, and then waves his hand at his computer. “I need to finish...this,” he says. “Geoff’s waiting on it.”

There’s this note to his voice Ryan doesn’t like at all, a nasty sort of panic, desperation, Ryan’s seen from people in Gavin’s shoes working for complete bastards. Assholes that like to throw their weight around, step on the little guy.

Not something he’d expect out of someone in this crew, but he knows they all didn’t start out here. Had to work their way here somehow, and Ryan knows how that goes.

“I don’t think he’d want you to kill yourself over it either, Gavin,” Ryan says, and waits for his words to sink in. “Do you?”

He’s been with the crew for a short time, but everything he’s seen tells him he’s right on that. That Gavin will too, when he shakes off whatever memory has hold of him now.

“I – no,” Gavin says, and tries for a laugh that comes out as a tired sigh. “I just. We’re so close.”

Ryan knows that feeling, throwing yourself into something so hard everything else fades away but no matter how hard you try it slips away from you. That desperation to just finish what you started tantalizingly out of reach and all the more frustrating for it.

“I know, Gavin, I know,” Ryan says, hand on Gavin’s shoulder because he looks like he needs it. “But you might have better luck if you get some sleep first. Recharge your brain.”

He gets a frown for that, Gavin fidgeting with the cuffs of his hoodie.

“Don’t think I can sleep right now,” he says, gesturing at his head. “Too much noise up there.”

Ryan stares at him for a moment because he knows that feeling all too well. Too tired to function and too tired to sleep, your brain buzzing loud enough to be maddening.

“Well,” he says. “Jeremy’s still trying to figure out what’s wrong with his car. Want to go down and make fun of him with me?”

Gently, of course, because Jeremy’s been at it for the last couple of days and is at the wrench-throwing phase of things if pushed too far. 

They can set Gavin up on a stool in the garage while Jeremy bitches about his car. Turn the space heaters up so they keep Gavin warm down there and his brain starts to settle until he can sleep.

Even tired as he is, Gavin blushes at the mention of Jeremy. Still adamant that it’s a one-sided thing no matter how many hints Ryan drops about it otherwise.

“Do I get to hold the flashlight this time?” he asks, letting Ryan nudge him along, tired smile on his face.

“Maybe,” Ryan says, because it’s such a coveted role. “We can negotiate when we get down there.”

========

There’s a thing Jeremy does from time to time when it comes to Gavin.

Happens when Gavin’s in a good mood, actual sleep under his belt or maybe just a little more than he allows himself with all the things he considers his responsibility.

Vibrant and bright and tossing these little jokes at Jeremy, his teasing right on the edge of full-out flirting with him.

And Jeremy, aright, he jokes and teases right back. Lit up with it the same way Gavin is and while it makes things hell on everyone around them when it happens, it’s even worse when Jeremy -

Something snaps him out of that mindset, like a hand coming down on his shoulder and giving him this rough little shake, and Ryan can see the moment it happens. Sees the way the easy grin slides of Jeremy’s face and the armor comes into play.

He gets a little mean, comes back at Gavin a little sharper than he normally does. Shrugs him off if Gavin’s feeling tactile, puts whatever space between them he can and goes sullen and quiet and this hunted look to him when everyone looks to Gavin for his reaction.

Wounded look to him and quick to come up with an excuse to be anywhere but where Gavin is and it’s baffling as hell.

Stupid, too, but what the hell does Ryan know, right?

The few times he’s tried to bring it up to Jeremy he got snappish with him, which is fair enough so Ryan backed off. Let him have his stupidity and come around in his own time, only for it to happen again and again and it’s clearly something that’s been going on for a long time now because the rest of the crew takes it in stride.

Michael or Lindsay finding something to distract Gavin with until Jeremy stops being an idiot, if someone else doesn’t beat them to it.

Gavin just gives Ryan a helpless shrug and awkward little laugh like that’s just how things are with them, and don’t worry love, it’ll sort itself out eventually.

Idiots, all of them, and Ryan an even bigger one for worrying.

========

At this stage of things, Ryan would be lying to himself if he said he wasn’t sold on staying on with the crew once the heist is over. He’s been working with them for over a month and in too deep to back out without adding to those regrets of his. 

He’s learned to recognize good things when he sees them, even if he isn’t always smart enough to hold onto them. Even the...complicated nature of things with the Jones’ is something he’s learning to navigate better. (Oh, it’s still a disaster waiting to happen, but he’s learning to cope with that.)

Too fond by far of all these assholes to just walk away and some part of him suspects Meg knew this would happen when she called him.

A loud explosion draws Ryan attention away from his thoughts towards the balcony windows where he can see fireworks lighting up sky, drifting down over the street below.

Michael and the others on the roof letting them off in to celebration of another successful hurdle in the upcoming heist. Gavin and Matt cracking that encryption and Michael and Jeremy getting their hands on a chopper out from under NOOSE’s nose.

Preemptive on all their parts, perhaps, but they’ve been working hard on this, and it’s definitely helping boost crew morale by the sounds of it. Loud cheers and laughter as they set off fireworks and toasting one another to being that much closer to their goal.

A reason for celebrating for sure, and yet Ryan’s down here in the dark because -

“Ryan?”

Gavin, standing at the other end of the couch from him. Awkward little smile and huddled in his coat because it’s getting cold for Los Santos this close to winter.

Ryan frowns at Gavin, would have thought he’d still be upstairs with the others after all his hard work.

“Is everything okay?”

Gavin hems and haws, sidling ever close to Ryan as he does. He stands next to him for a long moment, both of them watching the fireworks display in companionable silence.

It’s...nice. 

Oddly peaceful, sounds from the party upstairs distant and muffled, worlds away from them. Makes a strange sort of sense for Gavin to lean against him, and Ryan to wrap an arm around his shoulders. 

For Gavin to turn his head and press a kiss to Ryan’s cheek, tension running through him and another awkward laugh when Ryan looks down at him.

Shy smile and all this nervousness to Gavin Ryan’s not sure how to read even with the kiss as a damn good clue.

“...Gavin?”

Gavin pulls away, quiet apologies tripping over themselves on the way out of his mouth, but he doesn’t run.

Stubborn, and braver than he thinks he is as he looks at Ryan, bottom lip caught between his teeth.

“It’s a lovely night,” Gavin says, ghost of Ramsey’s Golden Boy to it as his eyes flit to the view beyond the balcony, the fireworks starting to taper off. “Would be a shame not to enjoy it.”

Sounds like a perfect line for a perfect moment, but again, all this nervousness to it like Gavin’s not sure of himself.

Ryan frowns.

“What about Jeremy?” Ryan asks, and almost regrets it when Gavin winces away from him, pulls his coat closer. “Gavin?”

Gavin shakes his head, mouth pulled down. 

“He’s not interested in me like that,” he says, and laughs again, something bitter to it. “You’ve seen how he is, haven’t you? I mean, honestly, Ryan just look at me.”

Ryan looks, because Gavin’s an idiot. 

Brilliant and amazing and so damn dedicated to this crew of his, his family. Loyal as hell and somehow even more stubborn. 

So much good to him Ryan wouldn’t even know where to start, and stupidly, helplessly head over heels for Jeremy and still somehow convinced what he’s saying is true. That someone like Jeremy could never look at him and see the same things Ryan does. That Jeremy isn’t just as head over heels for him, and Christ, these two. Going in circles and getting nowhere and Ryan can see the toll it’s taking on Gavin.

How tired he looks, sad and worn down and hurting.

“There’s no harm,” Gavin murmurs, almost to himself. “No harm just for tonight, is there?”

A burst of laughter overheard has Gavin tilting his head, thinking hard for a moment before he closes the distance between them. Determined look in his eyes as he rocks up on the balls of his feet, precious few inches that allow him to seal a kiss, soft, chaste, before he drops down. Watches Ryan closely.

“If you want to, that is,” Gavin says, quiet little invitation. “No pressure, love.”

Ryan can’t speak, words caught in his throat because this is a mistake, he knows it. Been here before with promises of something simple and easy, no strings attached and why not have some fun?

Worse, somehow, because Gavin and Jeremy and their combined stupidity nothing seems to break past.

He doesn’t want to be one of Gavin’s mistakes, to fuck up whatever happiness he could have with Jeremy if he just realized it’s there waiting for him.

“Ryan,” Gavin says, fingers on his jaw, eyes searching his. “It’s fine if you don’t want to. We can put on a movie you can heckle to your heart’s content, or maybe play a round of that new game Alfredo was talking about the other day?”

It’s the fact Gavin’s being so careful about this, them, that Ryan agrees at all. Gives in because it’s been so long and he’s been so good. Genuinely happy for Michael and Lindsay and dwelling over his own choices for too goddamned long and he wants to forget, for just a little while the way Gavin so clearly wants to.

Too easy to accept what he’s offering because he recognizes that same need, want, in Gavin and more than anything else he trusts him to know what they’re doing.

Ryan leans down for another kiss, Gavin’s lips curving into a smile as he does. 

Hands cradling Ryan’s face, warm breath brushing against his throat as Gavin ducks his head, suddenly shy.

Ryan snorts, and that seems to hit Gavin just right, body shaking with helpless laughter as he looks up at Ryan.

“Yeah?” he asks, head tipped to the side.

Still that edge of shyness to it, something delighted creeping in, hint of anticipation.

“I mean,” Ryan says, hands skimming up Gavin’s sides. “We could always watch that movie - “

Gavin scowls at him, all bark and no bite to it and Ryan lets him drag him down the hall to his room, soft laughter chasing away the quiet.

========

There’s a moment, two, after that night where Ryan’s worried he made the wrong decisions. That he’s irrevocably changed things between him and Gavin for the worse - 

And then Gavin proves him wrong.

Still laughs and jokes with him, snares him with his bizarre questions and cajoles him into causing trouble for the others. (Just a little bit.)

Moves a little lighter, like a weights been lifted off him. Laughs louder, smiles brighter.

He seems happier, and Ryan’s glad for it, because he feels the same in his own way, but he still worries.

Doesn’t want to lead Gavin on because he loves the little idiot, but he’s not _in love_ with him.

Dares a lot (everything) one of the nights they slip off together to the surprisingly modest apartment Gavin keeps away from the penthouse when the crew’s not in the middle of something big, and admits it out loud.

He’s not sure what kind of reaction he’s expecting, but Gavin’s laughter and bright grin are a relief.

“Ryan,” he says, fond and exasperated. “I know that, you dummy.”

His grin widens as he kisses Ryan, no strings attached. Leans in to whisper, like it’s the world’s greatest secret, “I’m not in love with you either, in case you were wondering.”

Mischief in his eyes as he pulls back to look at Ryan, soft and fond and this touch of assholishness to it Ryan’s actually missed seeing.

“Oh, well,” Ryan says, watching Gavin watching him. “That’s a relief.”

It really is.

They’ve gotten looks from the others who realize something’s changed between them, but not what. (Yet, anyway.)

Concerned, worried. 

About them. Their choices. 

And then there’s Jeremy who seems to have come to the belated realization about his feelings towards Gavin. All this time and it turns out he’s denser than Ryan thought, didn’t even know how he felt about Gavin until now, and _Jesus Christ_. (It would be funny if it weren’t so goddamned sad.)

Gavin rests his chin on Ryan’s chest, sigh ghosting out of him.

“It is, isn’t it?” he says, and snatches another kiss from Ryan that leads to more as they steal time for themselves, just a little longer.

========

Jeremy gets quiet for a while, goes all introspective about things and Ryan lets him have his space because he’s not that much of an asshole.

Goes to Geoff looking for work that will allow him to give Jeremy the space he needs, and gets this _look_ and a heavy sigh in return.

“You better know what you’re doing,” he warns, and Ryan’s not sure what – who – he’s talking about anymore, but neither does Geoff for once.

Ryan laughs, because hell if he does. Making it up as he goes along and trusting Gavin not to lead them wrong.

Another heavy sigh from Geoff and this tired smile like he knows what it’s like. (Maybe he does.)

“Fine, fine. There’s an asshole up in Blaine County who’s been giving some of our guys trouble. Trevor’s got the details, get the hell out of here and talk to him about it.”

========

Trevor’s not thrilled to see him given his friendship with Jeremy, but he relents when Ryan tells him why he’s there.

“The Carver Situation, is it?” he asks, all cool and impersonal as he digs up an actual manila folder from the depths of his desk and waves it at Ryan. “Nasty piece of work that man.”

A pause, Trevor regarding Ryan intently.

“Better take Fredo with you, just in case.”

It should sound like an insult, but Ryan’s learning that’s just how the Fakes operate sometimes. 

Passive-aggressive as hell when they’re irritated with you and want you to know, but still concerned about you going out and getting yourself dead for stupid reasons.

So.

“Thanks, great,” Ryan says, and takes the folder from Trevor when he waves it at him again. “We’ll let you know how it all works out.”

Trevor makes this little noise in his throat, judgmental as hell and shoos Ryan out of his office with a flick of his hands.

“Yes, yes, now please get the hell out and do your job.”

Echoes of Geoff there, or maybe it’s the other way around. 

Either way, Ryan walks out laughing.

========

Carver goes down surprisingly easy, for someone who managed to cause as much havoc as he did.

There are others after him, opportunistic bastards hoping to hurt the Fakes somehow, knock them off their pedestal because everyone’s waiting on them to do something big soon.

Don’t trust the relative peace that’s fallen over Los Santos as they gear up for the heist, want to strike before it’s too late and so on and so on.

Hit and runs attacks and seek and destroy missions, and Ryan gets sent out to deal with most of them.

Sometimes Alfredo’s along for the ride, madman’s grin and steady hands and more than a little terrifying. 

Trevor’s right hand man and just. Terrifying. Quietly competent and self-assured and the kind of man who’d smile at you one moment and put a knife in your back the next if Trevor gave the word. So...yes.)

Sometimes it’s Michael, angry and sullen and glaring daggers at Ryan as they handle the latest threat to the crew. Unspoken threats regarding Ryan and Gavin and the confusion the two of them are causing the others with this new level to their relationship and how cavalierly they’re treating it. (Ryan may have accidentally overheard Michael bitching about it to Lindsay, once or twice, because irony.)

Most of the time, however, it’s Jeremy.

Still struggling with his feelings for Gavin with all the obliviousness on his part and also, yes, the Ryan-and-Gavin thing.

Shoots Ryan these looks like he wants to ask about it, but doesn’t know _how_. 

Trying to show his support for them one minute and confused as hell as to what’s going on with them the next, and Ryan doesn’t really blame him.

It’s an awkward, frustrating time for them because Ryan doesn’t know what the hell to do about it.

Wants to sit Jeremy down and explain everything because as complicated as it seems – and it _is_ \- it also isn’t?

Something, anyway.

But Jeremy’s great at deflecting, almost as good as Gavin is and Ryan ends up in the middle of the world’s stupidest...stupid thing. (He can’t in good conscience call it a love triangle like the ones Vinewood loves so much, but hell if he knows what to call it.)

And even if Jeremy would stand still long enough for Ryan to actually talk to him, there’s Gavin to think about too.

Slowly coming around to considering the possibility that yes, Jeremy does have the soft fuzzies for him with the way he’s been acting lately and you’ll never know if you don’t try and don’t look at me like that. I know I’m a raging hypocrite. (There’s a stark difference between the situation with the three of them and the unholy mess between Ryan and the Jones’.)

So really, it’s a good thing when Ryan gets shot.

========

_Really._

========

It happens with one of the assholes Trevor sends them after, a bad situation and no Jeremy in no way at fault for it, but try telling him that.

“No, really,” Ryan says, wincing as Gavin cleans dried blood away from the stitches before changing the bandage. “I keep trying to tell him it wasn’t his fault and the idiot just won’t listen.”

The two of them are in his room at the penthouse. Gavin with this little frown of concentration on his face and Ryan...complaining about Jeremy being an idiot.

Gavin _mm-hmm_s him because the part where he’s trying to keep Ryan’s injury from getting infected, which is nice and all but also kind of rude.

Hurtful, even.

_“Hey,”_ Ryan says, and gets a little smirk from Gavin.

“I don’t know what you want me to say, Ryan,” Gavin says. “You’ve met the man, haven’t you?”

And, yes. Okay, Ryan has. He gets what Gavin’s getting at with that, he really does. The whole thing where Jeremy’s the kind of idiot who would consider it his fault if his partner got hurt when he was supposed to be watching his back, but come on.

Shit happens in their line of work. No one likes to admit it, but luck plays a major part in things, and sometimes you get dealt a bad hand and he’s probably mixing metaphors again, but the point is it isn’t Jeremy’s fault Ryan got shot.

It happens.

Ryan sighs, this grumbly little thing that’s equal parts exasperation and frustration because he knows Jeremy knows, but the little bastard is taking the whole thing way too hard for what it is.

Gavin chuckles, and when Ryan looks up he’s got this little smile on his face.

Soft, fond. Amusement in his eyes and just. Laughing at Ryan because he can, because he’s the kind of asshole who would.

“Hey,” Ryan says, softer this time, because he’s wounded here, okay. Just look at him. Hole in his shoulder and stitches to keep him together and a little sympathy would be nice, you know?

Gavin shakes his head as he tapes the new bandage in place and pulls off the latex gloves he hates so much, slings them into the trash he brought over and just. 

Looks at Ryan.

Sad little Vagabond with an aching shoulder and headache of a partner not to mention the utterly heartless Gavin staring him down.

Reaches out to smooth away unruly hair thanks to Ryan’s mask and a hell of a day and presses a kiss to his forehead.

“Give him some time, yeah?” Gavin says. “He’ll come around.”

Ryan sighs again because he knows that, he just. He doesn’t like Jeremy feeling guilty about something that isn’t his fault, doesn’t want him carrying that around.

“Yeah,” Ryan says, because Gavin’s right the way he tends to be on most things despite all logic. “Yeah, okay.”

========

Ryan’s not a fan of the way Jeremy avoids him after that. Blatant as hell as he scurries out of the room when he sees Ryan, but he doesn’t say anything about it.

Shrugs when Geoff and Jack give him questioning looks, worried about a falling out between them caused by the clusterfuck that got Ryan shot. Tells them it’s a Jeremy thing because apparently it is, according to Gavin.

Idiot who takes on blame for something out of his control, comes down hard on himself when everyone else knows it’s just life being shitty.

Michael's eyeing Ryan thoughtfully, which is a bit worrisome because Ryan doesn’t know what he did to bring that about, and Lindsay? 

God knows what she’s doing, but part of it involves her trying to sneak up on him at the penthouse in the most obvious way possibly and humming the _Mission Impossible_ theme under her breath. 

(Absolutely no one comments on it, which Ryan takes to mean they want no part of it and hope it stays that way.)

Eventually, though, either Geoff has enough or Gavin’s right and Jeremy comes around on his own terms.

Ryan’s in the kitchen making another brave attempt at getting this coffee drinking thing down and he hears footsteps behind him.

No annoyed huff at seeing him or familiar theme tune to be heard, just this awkward little shuffle and Jeremy clearing his throat.

Also?

“Jesus Christ, how much sugar are you going to put in?”

Look.

Coffee is disgusting, but it also provides sweet, sweet caffeine that Ryan needs to operate in a vaguely human-shaped manner most days.

Usually he relies on diet soda for that, or even an energy drink or two. In dire times when neither are close to hand and he can’t be bothered to go out and get some because _why_, he’s desperate enough to turn to coffee.

“As much as it takes, Jeremy,” Ryan says grimly. “As much as it takes.” 

He doesn’t look over at Jeremy, too busy contemplating the cup of coffee he’s just made himself.

More creamer in it than should be allowed, he’s sure, and twice that for sugar at the very least. Can’t really be classified as coffee anymore, but he’s well past caring at this point.

He takes a deep breath and braces himself before drinking the damn thing in one go. The creamer and time spent faffing about have brought the temperature down enough that it doesn’t burn his mouth and throat going down, but he can still taste the coffee which is just. _Eughhh._

It takes a moment after that horrible experience for Ryan to realize Jeremy’s laughing at him. That wheezy, gaspy thing he does when he can’t believe the people he works with are just that stupid.

Ryan looks over at him then, because rude, and also he hasn’t heard Jeremy really laugh in far too long - 

“Hey, so,” Jeremy says, between bouts of wheezy laughter. “I saw we were out of diet soda and went out to get some.”

\- and sees Jeremy with a case of diet soda in his hand, the son of a bitch.

He doesn’t claim it’s an unnecessary apology gift or peace offering or whatever the hell is going on in his head, but Ryan knows that it is. 

Just the way he knows Jeremy’s back to normal because he fucking well waited for Ryan to down that sludge everyone here calls coffee just to watch him suffer because Jeremy is an asshole.

“Thanks,” Ryan says, and has to clear his throat because it comes out hoarse and tortured. “Thanks ever so much, Jeremy.”

Jeremy breaks out into laughter again, and Ryan can’t even be mad about it. He does, however, snatch the diet soda from Jeremy before he drops it with the way he’s laughing so goddamn hard.

========

Ryan’s a hypocrite.

He’s known that for a long time now, even made his peace with it as things like that go.

So when Gavin gets shot, he’s not really up to hearing all the reasons it’s not his fault even though he knows in the back of his head that Gavin’s right.

Another prep phase and another step closer to the heist proper and some goon with a gun who gets lucky. Hits Gavin in the side and Ryan knows he’ll get the privilege of reliving the moment the scrawny asshole went down in a tangle of limbs and this startled squawk in his nightmares for a long time to come.

“I was wearing a vest, you bell-end,” Gavin says, soft and worried because Ryan’s having a hard time letting it go.

Took the bastard responsible down without a second thought, dropped him and his buddy and checked on Gavin who was already picking himself up off the floor. Annoyed at himself for being caught off guard and confused as hell at why Ryan was making such a huge fuss over nothing like the idiot he is.

Ryan knows that, knows Geoff insists on it whenever he sends them out. Bare minimum or they don’t go out at all because he’s seen too many idiots go without and cares too much about them to let it happen to them.

“Yeah,” Ryan says, not really listening because he’s mapping the shape of the bruise blooming across Gavin’s ribs stark and ugly against his skin. “Yeah, okay.”

Gavin laughs, and either they didn’t shut the door to his room well enough or didn’t hear it open because - 

“Oh, oh, shit, I’m sorry!” Jeremy’s awkward, nervous laugh and everything else to it. “I heard about Gav and just wanted to see if he was alright, and uh. I’ll just. Be going now?”

Only he doesn’t. Shuffles his feet and while Ryan can’t see his face with his back to him, he knows Jeremy. 

Knows Gavin.

The two of them dancing around one another for ages and always out of step. (So close and so far and it hurts watching them like this.)

Ryan looks up at Gavin, feels himself smile at the way he’s biting his lip. Suddenly shy about being seen like this, embarrassed that Jeremy’s seeing him like this and hiding behind Ryan like there’s anything indecent going on. 

Ryan’s on his knees in front of a shirtless Gavin, which to be fair is kind of damning in that department, but it’s more about Ryan needing to remind himself that Gavin’s fine, okay, than anything else.

Still.

Ryan’s hands drop to Gavin’s hips, squeeze to get his attention and when he has it he raises an eyebrow at Gavin when he glances down at him. Tips his head towards Jeremy and leaves the ball in Gavin’s court, his decision what happens next.

He’s been making progress, painfully, glacially slow, with Gavin in regards to the Jeremy Problem, but progress nonetheless. 

Has a handy little flow chart and a few graphs drawn up somewhere around here about it. These Moments and such Gavin insists on passing off as Jeremy just being a good friend. (A really, really good friend who is maybe more concerned about Gavin and his well-being that Gavin realizes.

Ridiculous as hell but he’s caught Gavin studying them when he doesn’t think Ryan’s awake, or there to notice. (On top of being a hypocrite, Ryan is also a creepy bastard at times.)

Gavin’s looking at Jeremy with all this want in his eyes with him so close and maybe it’s wrong of Ryan to push him, them, like this, but he thinks it could be a good thing if they do it right. Handle things with care, and if anyone deserves something good in their life it’s these two idiots.

Gavin shakes his head, tiny, tiny movement. Something Jeremy must notice before he sighs, this heartbreakingly resigned thing as he moves to leave, and Ryan’s other eyebrow joins the first.

“You can stay!” Gavin blurts out, shrinking in on himself when Jeremy looks back at him. 

Gavin’s eyes dropping to Ryan’s for reassurance Ryan’s quick to give him as he rises to his feet and presses a kiss to Gavin’s forehead the way he’d done for Ryan not that long ago. 

“You can stay,” Gavin says again, breath warm against Ryan’s throat. “If you want to?”

Ryan smiles down at him, because he’s braver than he thinks in all things. Glances at Jeremy who is looking between the two of them like he thinks it’s a trap, a joke.

“...what?”

Christ, these two.

Ryan holds his hand out to Jeremy.

Just like it had to be Gavin’s choice to invite him, it needs to be Jeremy’s choice to accept what he’s offering.

Ryan’s hardly a neutral party in all this, but he’s not the one who stands the most to lose either.

Jeremy stares at them for a long, long moment, unsure – of the offer, himself, everything – and then he makes a half-step forward, focus shifting from Ryan to Gavin who is so, so quiet and still.

“Gav?” he asks, and oh goddamn, they’re killing him with this, they really are. “Are you sure?”

He darts a look at Ryan as though he has the answers Jeremy’s looking for, and in all honesty? He doesn’t. Flying blind here and hoping for the best, and this crew’s ruined him, because he’s never done something like that before. 

And yet?

Jeremy reaches for them.

========

Ryan tries to slip out without bothering the others, already moving towards one another to fill up the space he left behind, but Gavin’s a light sleeper. Hand wrapping around Ryan’s wrist before his eyes are fully open.

“Ryan?”

Ryan smiles down at him, flicks a look at Jeremy who is getting some well-earned rest after the last few weeks. Looks peaceful, _happy_, tangled up in Gavin.

“Shh, don’t want to wake him up, do you?”

Gavin follows his gaze, look of wonder in his eyes at seeing Jeremy there. Knowing he stayed.

“I’ve got some stuff to take care of,” Ryan lies, but just a little one. “Go back to seep, Gavin.”

Gavin squints up at him, suspicious as hell but he’s too tired to put up much of a fight and Ryan chuckles as he plants a kiss to the top of his head. 

“_Sleep_”, he says, because no one around here does near enough of that, especially Gavin. 

Gavin snorts, but settles back down easily enough, and Ryan finishes dressing – can’t find his damn shirt anywhere but his jacket will do until he can get to his room.

Looks back once before he leaves, and smiles at something going right after this latest little disaster – and runs into Michael the moment he steps into the hallway.

Perfect.

Michael looks just as surprised to see him, eyebrows going up at he notices Ryan’s state of dress. (Or undress, as the case may be. No shirt but thanks God he’s wearing his mask again. Because reasons?)

“Hey,” he says pulling his gaze up to meet Ryan’s eyes. “You know where Jeremy is? He said he was going to check on Gavin and no one’s seen him since.”

Oh, even better.

Ryan coughs to clear his throat, and makes the mistake of glancing at Gavin’s door, hears his muttered, _”Oh, for fuck’s sake_ that’s hard to gauge.

Michael’s processing, faint scowl shifting to a frown as he looks between Gavin’s door and Ryan like he’s expecting...what, Ryan doesn’t know.

“Huh,” Michael says. Cocks his head, just so. “Guess you should know if you hurt either of them - “

Jesus Christ, what even is Ryan’s life anymore?

“- I have to answer to you about it?” Ryan finishes, amused in spite of himself.

Michael bares his teeth in a little smile.

“Laugh it up if you want, asshole,” he says. “But I’m not joking.”

Yeah, no. 

Ryan knows.

“Good,” Ryan says, and means it. “I’ll hold you to that.”

========

Thankfully, it turns out to one of the rare quiet days around the penthouse. Heavy cloud cover and steady, gentle rain covering the city. Everyone out dealing with crew business or handling personal matter and Ryan doesn’t run into anyone else.

He considers going back to his own apartment since he hasn’t been back to it for a few days now, but he’s concerned it might send the wrong message to Gavin and Jeremy if he does, so.

Geoff has a deep selection of books to choose from, and Ryan spends his time deliberating before he grabs a cheesy looking science-fiction book from a used bookstore. Faded stick on the spine and colorful cover that makes it stand out from the rest of his collection of books. 

Impulse buy or something else, it’s lighter fare than anything else on hand and a good distraction. Ryan takes it over to the couch and settles down to read to pass the time.

Ryan’s a quarter way through it before Gavin wanders out apparently having found Ryan’s shirt in the meantime. Soft little smile on his face and this curious tilt to his head as he walks over.

“Hey,” Ryan says, smiling at Gavin’s wild mess of hair and sleepy expression. He pats the couch cushion next to him and Gavin’s smile widens as he sits down next to him.

Yawns, a moment later, big jaw-cracking affair and this quiet little noise that draws a laugh out of Ryan because it’s as ridiculous as the rest of him.

“Lazy,” he chides, which gets a pout from Gavin and him rearranging himself and Ryan until Gavin’s stretched out comfortably on the couch using Ryan as his pillow and grinning up at him like the cat that’s got the canary. “Sorry, I meant _super_ lazy.”

Gavin makes a face and grabs for the throw blanket on the back of the couch he cant quite reach, but before Ryan can help him with it they hear Jeremy clear his throat.

“Need a hand?” he asks, and while he sounds fine, he looks nervous as hell.

Uncertain smile as his gaze slides away from Ryan to Gavin and some point in between them, fidgeting with the throw blanket he picked up.

“That would be lovely,” Gavin says, a little too eagerly, which makes Jeremy look up in surprise.

“There’s plenty of room,” Ryan adds, and raises his eyebrows at Jeremy when he hesitates, still so unsure of his welcome.

A long pause, and Jeremy blows out a sigh and shakes the throw blanket out before dropping over Gavin. Stumbles a little as he walks around the arm of the couch to sit in the space they’ve made for him.

They sit in silence for another long moment before Gavin laughs at the ridiculous picture they must make and stretches his leg out to place his feet in Jeremy’s lap, grin on his face when Jeremy makes an affronted sound as he makes himself comfortable and things tilt a little more towards normal.

Ryan tosses the remote to Jeremy who gives him a grateful smile and he spends a few minutes channel surfing until he finds a wrestling match to watch. Ryan watches Gavin and Jeremy from the corner of his eye as Jeremy explains what’s going on to him, keeps his voice pitched low and until Gavin drifts back to sleep.

Jeremy trails off when he notices, watches Gavin for a long moment before laughing to himself and spares a glance at Ryan who knows he’s been caught out.

“This is okay, right?” Jeremy asks, as though he thinks Ryan has the final say in things.

So many things could go wrong with this, them, and yet?

“Yeah,” Ryan says, because this is another way the crew’s ruined him, gotten him to trust the people he works with, to know them. “Yeah it is.”

========

Ryan gets the feeling the Fake AH Crew is made up of busybodies, the way everyone reacts to the realization he and Gavin have brought Jeremy into their odd little relationship.

After his first run-in with Michael in the hallway he doesn’t get verbal threats so much as scowls and the occasional glare. A thoughtful look once or twice when Ryan ducks out of a lunch date or something else to give Gavin and Jeremy time together.

Subtly trying to get them to realize there’s more between them than friendship or a friends with benefits situation.

It’s...not exactly working the way he’d hoped, because even now Gavin’s half-convinced Jeremy doesn’t think about him like that, and Jeremy?

Jesus Christ.

Jeremy thinks he’s just there as some kind of novelty. 

Puts on a good front, all this bravado and confidence he doesn’t feel when he’s with them. Acts like he always does, but Ryan’s caught that uncertainty and longing in his eyes. Wistful smile and this...hesitance to ask for what he wants, needs.

Lets Gavin or Ryan call the shots and it’s - 

“Ryan,” Meg groans, connection spotty, staticky because international call and bad service and questionable setup. “You are an idiot.”

Well, that’s never been in question.

“That’s not news to me,” Ryan says, because it’s really not. 

Meg laughs, and some of her exhaustion bleeds into it, along with this rueful kind of fondness.

They haven’t had the chance to talk for too long. Meg in Europe for her grand tour of murder and mayhem, even if she would never phrase it as such, and Ryan doing whatever it is he’s doing. (Making a mess of his life the longer things go on, which is just business as usual for him, to be honest.)

“Be careful,” she says, and if Ryan didn’t know he deserves all these warnings from the people in his life for the choices he’s made recently it might be insulting.

As it is, though?

“I am. Will be. You know I wouldn’t do anything to hurt them,” he says, because he knows Gavin’s important to Meg, and she’s pretty fond of Jeremy for that reason alone.

Meg sighs, this long drawn out affair.

“I meant you, you dummy,” she says

That’s. Hmm.

“I’m fine,” he says, and it almost sounds like the truth.


	3. Speedster Gavin Superhero AU (Freewood)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Based on [this.](https://vagrantblvrd.tumblr.com/post/187695730361/random-thought-re-superhero-au-gavin-as-a)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Another victim of the great laptop crash of late 2019. (Many victims on that terrible day, such as roughly 4k words of utter ridiculousness and scenes added to help the story flow better/general shenanigans.)

Gavin’s fifteen or sixteen when he discovers his power. Plays a dumb little prank on Dan who figured his power out a year before, and it goes a bit...wrong. Ruins his favorite shirt and Dan – goofy, lovable, easygoing Dan – gets properly annoyed.

Gives Gavin this _look_ and starts to get up like he’s about to tackle Gavin and wrestle him down to make him cry uncle while he grinds his knuckles into the top of Gavin’s skull.

Gavin, laughing like an idiot in the face of such a dire threat jumps to his feet and _runs_.

Means to dart a few feet away and turn to laugh at Dan – always that little bit slower than Gavin, heavier footsteps and steady as the ground under their feet – and realizes he’s halfway down the damn block instead of in his backyard.

Blinks in shock because he’s always been quick on his feet and all that, but this?

A bit different.

He can hear Dan yelling for him, annoyance exchanged to alarm, worry, and looks up from where he’s pinching himself in case it’s one of those odd dreams he has sometimes. Winces when he pinches himself again as Dan comes jogging to view, relief and confusion on his own face as he spots Gavin.

“What on earth was that?” Dan asks, slightly out of breath as he comes to a stop in front of Gavin. Reaches out to give him a light shove like he’s checking Gavin’s real or something along those lines.

Gavin shoots him a scowl for the shove, and then looks down at his hands, little sparkles like electricity running across his skin starting to fade away. He can feel more of them all over, strange tingling on his scalp and knows from the look Dan’s giving him his hair’s standing up a little like he’s touched one of those plasma ball things.

“I don’t know what you’re on about,” Gavin says, and when Dan sighs in annoyance at that, Gavin means to skip out of arm’s reach and ends up on the other side of the street, which is a bit much, really.

========

Gavin’s always had an interest in cameras, film, and when he finds out one of his neighbors works for a film company using high-speed cameras - 

It’s not an obsession, the way Dan jokes about it, just more of a fascination.

Up until that point Gavin’s had a difficult time of it explaining to Dan or anyone else who’s found out about his powers what the world looks like to him when he’s using them. (Dan joking about Gavin having a hard time explaining given his unique way with words anything is expected and not as helpful as he likes to think it is.)

Gavin spends a summer when he’s not working striking up a friendship with his neighbor talking about cameras and the like, and the first time he’s allowed to film something using the high-speed camera Gavin falls in love. (Well, more so.)

He gets a job working as an assistant to his neighbor with a film company, and manages to get permission to use their high-speed camera to film things with it. Silly little things like the family cat or a bee in flight he stumbles on thanks to sheer dumb luck.

Once he gets a proper handle on things he gets an idea.

“You’re joking, right?” Dan asks, as the video Gavin showed him ends. “You really think you could be as popular as him?”

There’s a scientist on YouTube, absolutely brilliant man who makes these videos where he explains how science works. Bit of a celebrity online, and while there are times he comes off a little snide about things, snarky, it’s only made him that much more popular.

Not an overlarge following just yet, but he’s only made a handful of videos so far, each one gaining more views than the last.

“We don’t need to be,” Gavin points out, because that’s not the point of it, now is it? He just. It’s hard to explain.

He can’t just go about telling the world about his powers, not when he’s on a team of sorts with Dan. The two of them putting their powers to good use in between everything else going on in their lives, just.

The world is amazing as it is, but when he’s tapped into whatever allows him to run a mile in a fraction of a second or however long it actually takes him – it’s a million times more so.

To him, at least, and he wants to show people even if he can’t explain it to them. (Wants to share that with Dan, who’s put up with Gavin and his nonsense for years now, affable smile and game for anything and always steady.)

Dan stares at him for a long, long moment, and sighs. Corner of his mouth pulled up in this Dan sort of smile because he knows Gavin a little too well, doesn’t he? Has this power that would come in handy for the sort of things Gavin wants to film with that impenetrable skin of his.

“Right,” he says, and gestures to the things Gavin’s set up on his desk before he showed Dan that video. Couple of lab coats he ordered off the internet and his scuffed up football among them. “So what does that have do with anything?”

========

Things don’t really blow up for their YouTube channel until Gavin’s application for a spot on a team in the US is accepted a few years later.

Their unofficial team they’ve been on since they were kids was nice and all, but they both knew it wouldn’t last. Gave them a decent understanding of teamwork and a basic grasp of the kind of dangers they’d be facing if they were intent on a career in the whole superhero business.

And...to be honest, they hadn’t thought of not following through.

Dan’s got his heart set on working with a government funded team, chance and opportunities the private sector teams don’t usual get. (Eyeing the chance to pilot some of those sleek little planes the team use to get about, and Gavin doesn’t blame him.)

Gavin, for his part, has his heart set on a team he’s been following for years. Mismatched bunch and ridiculous about it, but they do a lot of good and he’s had the chance to talk to them over the years.

Strange little conventions and motivational speeches and whatnot they get asked to do, and all that. Better chance of his application being pushed through to the right people, and a track record (bit of a joke, that) in the business that might earn it serious consideration.

Dan watches Gavin – or the spots Gavin pauses long enough for him to see him – as Gavin flits about Dan's living room with the acceptance letter in his hand, something like electricity dancing on his skin and little burst of displaced air wherever Gavin comes to rest for a moment.

He feels giddy like a kid on Christmas morning again, or all those times when he and Dan were testing Gavin’s powers when he first discovered them. Giddy and elated and terrified out of his mind, just a bit, because it’s a huge step forward in life and he’s not sure he’ll measure up.

Dan knows Gavin, and sticks his foot out just so, managing to trip him up the next time Gavin moves at something approaching normal human speed. Laughs as Gavin falls on his face, too startled to think to use his powers to prevent it, and a jumble of wayward limbs and hair and hoodie blinking stupidly up at him.

“There you are,” he says, and snags the letter out of Gavin’s hands. “What do you say we get some bevs to celebrate?”

Gavin can’t get drunk, really. His metabolism burns through the alcohol too fast for it to have an effect on him, but he likes the taste. Likes the atmosphere, spending time with friends like Dan and the chance to relax, enjoy the moment.

========

Adjusting to a new team on its own is a stressful thing, Gavin finds out. Adjusting to a new team in a different country is just - 

“Hey, asshole.”

Gavin looks up from the mess he’s made of the area around him. Printouts from news outlets and his teams own support staff of the recent conflict downtown. Stills from security cameras and clips gathered from the internet from various bystanders with nowhere near enough common sense. Spilled mug of tea that went cold half an hour ago and his own battered laptop.

Half a city block in turmoil after a fight with a new villain on the scene, testing her powers and getting a bit in over her head so early on in her career.

“Burnie,” Gavin says, mopping up the spilled tea, trying not to look like the idiot he feels because he’s not even started on his report yet. Still seeing that one support being knocked down, idiot bystander watching it fall and time moving too slowly. “I’m just working on my report.”

Burnie sits down across from Gavin, corner of the cafeteria at HQ and this look in his eye Gavin doesn’t know what to make of.

Holds his gaze for a moment longer, and reaches over to snag a french fry – also cold – off his plate and chews thoughtfully.

“Hell of a mess out there today,” he says, attention flitting about the cafeteria.

Late or early depending on which side you’re seeing it from. 

Kitchen closed down, but there’s cold food set out for anyone up at this hour. Beverage station too, because sometimes you can’t sleep in this line of work and coffee is a mainstay, although Gavin still prefers his tea, and hot cocoa isn’t something to turn your nose up either. The ice machine makes this rattling noise every so often as it cycles, interesting way to judge the passage of time down here.

The little corner Gavin’s claimed for himself, the others scattered about, sipping their drinks and working on their own reports or holding off dreams that turn to nightmares to worse if allowed to fester. The few who just can’t sleep because of their powers, whiling away time until some bit of business calls them away.

Gavin _hmms_,clenching his hands and swears he can still feel the edge of a coat against his thin gloves, feel stitches tearing and that extra burst of speed born of panic and desperation, that little kick off pavement that sent the two of them rolling out of harm’s way barely in time.

Burnie steals another fry, gesture at the east-facing windows.

Quite the view, really. HQ built into the side of a mountain overlooking the city. Cheeky thing, inviting attacks from would-be villains and veterans alike. Beacon out here at the edge of it, deliberate to draw the worst of it away from heavily populated areas and provide the team with training areas in various terrain other than a standard gym and indoor obstacle course. 

“A lot to go wrong out there,” Burnie says, and Gavin knows he’s not just talking about today’s incident, because it’s just one in how many more to come. 

Other villains and other fights and Gavin’s starting to have doubts.

He can run fast, can do neat little parlor tricks with the power he’s been gifted with but - 

“And a lot can go right,” Burnie says, and Gavin finds himself looking away from the shapeless shadows beyond the windows and back at Burnie who smiles at him. 

Wry little thing, because he knows, doesn’t he. Started a little team himself, back in the day. Group of dumb kids just coming into their own powers and so sure they knew everything would work out for the best because that’s just how it is, isn’t it?

Good guys win, bad guys lose and everything’s right in the world as it should be.

No room for doubt when you know how things are supposed to go, unshakably so.

But then things happen, flip of a coin and everything goes to hell and you’re left to right things best you can as you can.

Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose and no knowing which one it’ll be.

Three of Gavin’s teammates are in medical, and thank God for his accelerated metabolism that helps kick start his healing or he’d be down there with them. (Beeping machines and solemn-faced nurses and a hell of a recovery time ahead of them, better than what could have been.)

There’s a list of civilian casualties, the ones Gavin and his team weren’t able to save, and his mind is stuck on the one he did. (How close it came to her name being added to the list.)

Burnie sighs, flicks the last bit of fry he’s holding at Gavin and sweeps the printouts and stills into a pile. Points at Gavin’s laptop and tells him to save his work.

“C’mon, Geoff’s got a batch of rookies he’s putting through orientation and I want to see their reactions when they realize what a huge mistake they made signing up with us.”

He grins then, big blinding thing like he doesn’t know how it hits people, easy sort of confidence that bleeds over into whoever it’s aimed at like they’re _something_ even without his powers amplifying things.

Charming and charismatic as hell, and a bit of a bastard to boot.

Gavin snorts as he does as he’s told and powers his laptop down to slide it into the messenger bag at his feet. Tosses what he can in there too and stuffs the soggy napkins used to clean up the spilled tea into the empty paper cup to dump at a station on their way out of the cafeteria.

========

Most superheroes who go big into the secret identity side of things choose occupations that won’t draw overdue attention to their civilian identity. 

Pick jobs that go unnoticed or if they are noticeable, strike a delicate balance between anonymity and a quiet sort of fame.

But with the advent of modern technology and its usage, the way the world changes so quickly it gets harder and harder for people like them.

Things like social media pop up and you get people like Gavin earning himself a unique sort of fame without meaning to.

Gets him in trouble with the team’s legal staff and others handling the secret identity side of things for them because he’s a unique sort of headache.

“Seriously,” Burnie says, laughing at Gavin slinking out of another meeting with the legal team and all that because he’s got a YouTube function coming up in a few months. All the usual faces and Gavin and Dan about to be tossed into the mix like lambs to the slaughter. “It’s your own fucking fault, you idiot.”

Gavin shoots him a half-hearted scowl.

Burnie’s not wrong, exactly, just - 

“We didn’t plan to get this,” Gavin waves a hand in a vague sort of circle. “...popular.”

They're not famous, not in any way that counts.

Goes about everyday things like errands and a quick little jog – normal human speed – to the store for groceries and the like because it’s been a while since he ran into his neighbors and they’re getting suspicious without being recognized nine times out of ten.

Does all sorts of things without someone asking him if he’s _that_ Gavin Free, from the internet and all those funny little videos.

It's that tenth time, though, that has the legal team and everyone else ready to tar and feather him, if not worse.

Having to filter all the things he and Dan are sent, from emails to things mailed to the PO box they have set up. Invitations and the like to events and other things that have steadily increased in number and importance over time.

Burnie rolls his eyes, and makes talking motions with his hand as he mimic Gavin in this terrible British accent. Makes his voice high-pitched and whiny as well because he’s the adult in this situation.

========

So there’s a little snag to do with the upcoming YouTube event.

“Dan,” Gavin whines, sounds nothing at all like the voice Burnie likes to use for him. “Oh my God, _Dan_.”

Dan is ignoring Gavin from long practice with it, but the bastard’s laughing at him, eyes crinkled with it and lips quirked in this not-quite-a-smirk under that hideous beard he’s insisted on growing out.

There’s a paused video on Gavin’s laptop, newer model to help him edit their videos on the go and all, and -

“He’s got quite the subscription count these days, doesn't he,” Dan muses, snatching Gavin's laptop away to scroll down. “And just look at these comments!”

Gavin makes this noise in his throat and tries to get his laptop back but Dan’s well-versed in Gavin’s everything and blocks him easily enough. Keeps scrolling down until he gets to a comment that may or may not be attached to one of Gavin’s old accounts he used to have before their channel got popular. 

One only a few people know about anymore that Gavin uses when he wants to be a little more anonymous on the internet. Leave comments on a video or forum post or wherever and not be mobbed by fans of his angling for a shout out or some troll looking to knock him down a peg just to be noticed.

“This one sounds like a wanker,” Dan says, somehow keeping a straight face as Gavin paws at him for his laptop back. “Teacher’s pet wannabe, I reckon.”

Gavin’s usually not one to abuse hi powers, or at least if he does doesn’t do it for quite the same reasons, taps into his speed to snatch his laptop from Dan and deal him a sound smack to the back of his head for being a bully.

“Not helpful,” Gavin says, shutting his laptop so Dan can’t use Gavin’s ridiculousness on it against him. “What am I going to do?”

The scientist who gave Gavin the idea for their channel right down to the damn lab coats (multiple sets by now) they’ve destroyed over the years is going to be at the YouTube event.

Has, as Dan pointed out, grown quite the following since his first few videos. Gotten a television special or two, and donated the proceeds to scholarships and programs encouraging kids to explore the sciences and all that. Started a few scholarships of his own and done a lot of good with his newfound fame, and Gavin and Dan are in their backyards blowing things up and setting them on fire.

Not quite the same playing field, nowhere close, really, and -

“Wasn’t it you,” Dan says, turning just the slightest bit serious as he looks at Gavin. “Wasn’t it you who said not to meet your heroes?”

Gavin winces because Dan’s not wrong, but he’s not entirely right either.

The time Gavin said that to him, was a year or so after he’d joined up with the Roosters. Burnie and Gus dragging him and Barbara and a few others to an annual conference sort of thing the big teams attended. Meant to promote a sense of community between the teams, foster camaraderie and hopefully eliminate the “friendly” rivalries between teams that caused rifts in their community.

Gavin had had the luck to meet a hero he’d looked up to as a child, only to realize he wasn’t quite what he represented himself as.

Cool and arrogant and shockingly uninformed. Dismissive of the Roosters even though they were proving themselves to be on par with the older established teams at a steady rate. 

Disappointing all around and this little sigh from Gus because he’d warned Gavin, hadn’t he? Word of advice in private and this look to him like he was talking from experience, but no sign of gloating at being proven right, no.

Just a gentle nudge and “Burnie’s planning on roping Geoff on stage for his talk, we definitely don’t want to miss that.” because Gus is a bastard through and through and damn good mentor and friend.

“It’s not the same thing, B,” Gavin says, even thought it almost certainly is. “The man’s brilliant.”

Terrifyingly smart and funny. He’s torn many an idiot to shreds over the years, appeared before congress on matters affecting the planet and humanity’s care-taking duty and - 

Gavin may, may, have a bit of an infatuation going on there.

One Dan has mercilessly mocked him about for some time now, in fact.

“Oh, well then,” Dan says, and laughs himself sick, the unhelpful bastard.

========

Gavin gets thrown through a wall.

Brick and mortar and all this pain and blood and the possibility he’s made the wrong career choice.

Breaks a few bones here, a few there. Damn near kills himself grabbing the thingamajig the villain of the week wants to use for nefarious purposes and keeping it from them long enough of the rest of the team to neutralize him. 

After that he spends the better part of a week in medical because super-speed healing isn’t always a good thing, is it.

Not when his bones heal all wrong and he has to have them re-broken several times over before the doctors get it right. Metabolism burning through anesthetic too fast to have any effect so he gets to experience it all without that hazy out of body feeling. 

By the time they're done it’s enough make him rethink some things.

“Burnie,” Gavin says, because of course he’s there. Been there the whole time, let Gavin hold his hand through surgery after surgery after surgery. “I’m not going to wear a suit.”

Burnie frowns at him, not sure what he’s talking about, and Gavin snorts, because they’ve talked about this at length, haven't they? Gone back and forth about it because Burnie’s of a mind that you dress to impress for certain things, makes you seem more together than you really are. Take things seriously and all that.

“For the YouTube thing,” Gavin says, still a goddamned mess about it because there are days he’s still that dumb kid running around his hometown, not whatever the world thinks he is. “No suit.”

Burnie stares at him like he’s an idiot – not wrong on that one – and then he sighs, because Gavin’s one of _his_ idiots.

“Jesus Christ,” he mutters, as though Gavin is unbelievable, an ignoramus, and gives Gavin’s hand a squeeze. “Fine. No suit, you asshole.”

========

They fly Dan over from England for the event, and to Burnie’s delight he’s wearing a suit.

Well, tuxedo, really. 

“See?” Burnie says, elbow digging into Gavin’s side. “That’s a man with a head on his shoulders.”

Burnie’s there acting as Gavin’s mentor of sorts, simple enough cover story because he knows _everyone_. Helped smooth things over the team’s legal and whatever else couldn’t by charming the rest, and anyway, it would feel wrong if he wasn’t here.

Gavin swirls his drink in his hand, champagne or something like that. Bubbly stuff at any rate and laughs, because Dan’s got this look on his face. Going for suave and charming and no doubt humming the Bond theme in his head. 

“Wonder he fit it through the doorway,” Gavin says, just loud enough for Dan to hear as he reaches them. 

Switch out that insufferable expression on his face for mock indignation and a _”Hey, now.”_

Gavin gives him an innocent look, and Dan scowls, but it doesn't last long before he’s pulling Gavin in for a hug, startling him because they don’t really do that, the two of them, but there they are. Dan squeezing the life out of him and Burnie slipping Gavin’s drink out of his hand as he wanders away to schmooze with important figures about the room.

“Uh, B?” Gavin asks, not sure what prompted the hug, only to have Dan’s hold tighten.

Eventually he lets go, pulls back enough to squint at Gavin, look him over, and it clicks.

Dan was on a mission with his own team when Gavin was injured, couldn’t get to the states when he went through surgery and all that.

They’ve talked since then, Gavin doing his best to downplay events to keep Dan from worrying, but, well. No chance of it working, any more than it would have with Gavin if their roles were reversed. 

“I’m fine,” Gavin says, because he is. 

For the most part anyway, and the rest of him is getting there, bit by bit. Seeing the team shrink about it, regular visits and working through the event until it becomes just another Thing in a long line of them because that’s just how things go for people like them.

Dan gives him a look, and Gavin knows he knows, the way Gavin knows about Dan’s Things and the way they have of sticking with him.

He looks like he’s about to say something about it, but a commotion off to the side draws their attention. Have them turning to see Burnie leading someone over to them, being stopped every so often by other YouTubers.

“Oh, shite,” Gavin says, hand snapping out to grab the sleeve of Dan’s tux. “_Dan_.”

Dan's shaking, muffled laughter and this gleam in his eyes, mouth curved in a wide grin and he’s the worst really, because he pulls his sleeve out of Gavin’s hand and waves at Burnie over the crowd. Raises his voice and calls them over, helping to part the crowd as Burnie and his friend continue on their way. 

Gavin steps closer to Dan, and discreetly (he hopes) looks for exits.

“Take it easy, B,” Dan says, voice lowered. “You’re going to make the poor man think you don't like him.”

Gavin shoots Dan a disbelieving look - 

“And this is Gavin and Dan,” he hears, Burnie’s voice and all this pride to it, like the two of them have gone and cured cancer or something else just as impressive instead of making their dumb little videos. “The Slow Mo Guys.”

\- only to have Dan dig his elbow into his side, little stab of pain there and gone as he turns to Burnie and his acquaintance.

Tall, broad-shouldered. Neatly combed hair and this charming little smile. Lights catching on his glasses just so and Gavin honestly feels a bit nauseous. (His own voice, rueful and a bit something else as he advises Dan against meeting his heroes because it’s not always what it’s cracked up to be.)

“Gavin, Dan,” Burnie says, smug bastard because he knows about Gavin’s little celebrity crush. “This is Dr. Haywood.”

Runs a wildly successful YouTube channel, all this science and such. Fans of all ages and all that.

Somehow even more attractive in person and dear God, Gavin’s forgotten how words work because he’s just staring at the man, isn’t he? Starstruck and pathetic about it, so Dan takes the lead this time around.

Steps forward to shake the good doctor’s hand, warm greeting and apologizing for Gavin who’s a bit jet-lagged still. Long flight, you know how it is and Gavin is still staring.

Gets a little frown from Doctor Haywood before he shrugs, smile widening when Gavin finally remember how to be a functioning human being and shake his hand.

“Please,” Dr. Haywood says, charming as hell about it. “Call me Ryan.”

========

There’s a crisis that has several teams working together to handle. 

Villain with a vendetta against the world – most of them do, sooner or later – and a plan that comes terrifyingly close to working.

They lose some of theirs to her, heroic sacrifices that had to be made because that happens sometimes. No time to come up with another solution and lives on the line and it’s exhausting work picking the pieces up afterward.

Heartbreaking.

Leaves you questioning your decision to get into the hero business when it never ends because God knows there’s going to be someone else doing the same damn thing in no time. Power vacuum left behind and people scrambling to snatch what they can for themselves Grudges and bitter resentment and all this hate in them for those who did them wrong.

Burnie comes to him in the aftermath, finds Gavin holed up in the rooms they have for him at HQ because he’s never really bothered to get a place of his own outside of it.

Sits down in the uncomfortable little chair he was given and drums his fingers on Gavin’s the arm of it. Watches the news Gavin has playing, sound off because he can’t bear to hear so-called experts give their views on what happened, how it could have gone better _if only_.

“Geoff’s starting a team of his own,” Burnie says, snapping Gavin’s attention back to him as he flicks a hand at the television. “This happened at a bad tie for it, but. Yeah.”

Burnie sighs, and for the first time in Gavin’s memory he looks his age. Decades in the hero business and he’s never looked to tired, so old. Worn down by the things thy do, see. The people they work with, live with. Laugh and joke with, even argue with from time to time because nothing’s perfect.

All of that, and bonds form because they can’t not in this kind of environment, and then some twist of fate takes them away from you. Doesn’t give a damn about the hurt and confusion left behind, the grief.

“Geoff’s starting a team of his own,” Burnie repeats, and gives Gavin this little smile. “And he’s thinking about asking you to join it.”

Gavin blinks, not sure he’s heard right.

He likes Geoff, considers him a good friend. Bit more than a mentor, the way they get on, and something of an annoyance to Burnie and some of the others with the shit they pull around HQ sometimes.

One of Burnie’s original team, and - 

“What?”

Burnie laughs, smile reaching his eyes for the first time in a while when he gives Gavin this _look_.

“Think about it,” he says, because he knows how things are. Knows sometimes you have to try something different to grow, become better than you are and Gavin’s felt restless for a while now. Itch under his skin and something else that’s had him back and forth to visit Dan in England several times now because he doesn’t know what it’s all about. “Do what you need to for yourself for once, you idiot.”

Gavin sputters, because that’s a touch uncalled for, and Burnie’s laughing like everything will turn out alright in the end and Gavin hopes like hell he’s right.

========

The press has a dam field day when they find out about Geoff’s new team.

All sorts of rumors and lies and slander. Sly implications that things have been headed this way for a long time now, Geoff chafing under the restriction Burnie and the other Founders put on him like they know a damn thing about anything.

“Ignore them,” Geoff says, arm slung around Gavin’s shoulders as they sift through dossiers Burnie sent them. Applications and the like, a few suggestions he’s put together for potential recruits who might not be looking for a team, but definitely need one. “Fuckers like them love to hear their own voices.”

Well, yes.

That’s the whole point, isn’t it? Talk and talk and talk and get anyone to listen to them, buy into the vitriol they’re slinging and pull them around to their way of thinking. 

They look up when Jack comes in, phone held up and look on his face like he’s found something they need to look at.

“I found something you need to look at,” he says, and grins like an idiot as he shows them shaky camera phone footage of someone fending off a villain using a sword, of all things.

Geoff sits up to grab Jack’s phone, eyebrows climbing his forehead.

“Is that - “

Jack’s grin widens, and he practically bounces on his toes. “A divine weapon? Yes!”

Gavin leans in beside Geoff because those are rare on the ground these days. Passed down generation to generation and a habit of being lost over time as bloodlines die out.

The figure wielding the blade looks terribly small up against his opponent, brutish figure made of stone. A golem of some sort by the looks of it, and he’s forcing his opponent to give ground. Blindingly fast with that sword of his that glows an eerie blue-white, snarl of rage on his face and quick on his feet.

The video cuts off a few moments later, phone’s owner forced to find cover as the swordsman calls up an attack, beam of light shooting from the sword towards the golem that overwhelms the camera phone's limitations. 

“He won, by the way,” Jack says, when Geoff and Gavin look to him because of course he would have looked into things to find out how the battle ended. “Took out the golem and its summoner with minimal casualties.”

Geoff makes this thoughtful noise as he looks back down at Jack’s phone to replay the video. Pauses it as the person filming zooms in on the swordsman.

Younger than you’d expect for someone wielding a divine weapon, but from what Gavin’s heard that tends to be a trend. Fate and destiny giving no fucks about things like that. Picks their chosen ones and that’s that, no avoiding it.

Run and hide for a while, maybe, but there’s no escaping it.

Seems a bit unfair, that. Even Gavin has a choice. Could quit and walk away from the hero business if he wanted, power or no power. 

So could Geoff, or Jack. Anyone else, really.

People like this swordsman, though -

“Where the hell is this?” Geoff asks, watching the video a third time through and clearly interested in adding the swordsman to the rather small roster for his team. “And how do we find him?”  
“New Jersey,” Jack says, and also? “Our flight leaves in four hours.”

========

Michael Jones is certainly an experience.

Unimpressed with the three of them and the offer they have for him and understandably leery of joining a team.

They don’t always work, is the thing. Can be made up of people with the best of intentions and do all the wrong things. 

It’s happened before, and they all know it will happen again.

“Look,” he says, toys with the handle of his coffee mug as he leans back. “Not that I don't appreciate all this, but I don’t think it’d work out.”

Has this look to him like he’d be glad to show them what he can do with that sword of his if they push him on taking up their offer, but he’s willing to play nice for now. Give them the benefit of the doubt and all that.

Geoff nods, because he’s been at this longer than anyone else here, including Jack. Knows how it is, has seen his fare share of people like Michael. Guided by fate and destiny and all that because he happened to be born into a family blessed (cursed) to wield a weapon of divine light.

Different than most in the hero business, and sometimes they are better off on their own.

“Do me a favor?” Geoff asks, and grins at the look Michael gives him. Annoyance with a side of irritation and topped off with _really?_. “Think about it?”

Michael sighs, and just as he’s about to tell Geoff – politely, Gavin’s sure – to go fuck himself, the jewel set in the pommel of his sword flares to life.

“Oh, goddammit,” Michael mutters, snatching the sword up where it’s leaning against the side of 1the booth. Glares at them as the sounds of screaming starts up somewhere down the street. “If you assholes were serious about wanting to demonstrate what working like a team is like, now would be a good time for that. Otherwise you can fuck off.”

========

Geoff moves them to a facility on the other side of the city. Former HQ for the Roosters a few years back before they outgrew it.

Needs a little TLC, as Geoff puts it, and wholesale renovation as Jack puts it.

It’s just the three of them at the moment, Michael handling lose ends and the like in Jersey before he can move out here. A few prospects they’re waiting to hear back from and perfect time for Gavin to take a little time for his civilian alter ego.

Puts in an official request for time off and immediately zips off to see Dan _because_.

“Is this about the collaboration?” Dan asks, sleepy eyed and only slight annoyed at finding Gavin on his doorstep in the middle of the night. “Because I thought you wanted to do it.”

Gavin _does_, is the thing. Very much a lot does, and that’s the problem.

Dan’s headed off on a mission with his team in a few days, and Gavin’s going to be the one working with Dr. Haywood – with _Ryan_. 

The two of them filming a video for hours on end and in close proximity and interacting and all, and if Gavin was a mess at the YouTube event, this is a disaster of unimaginable proportions about to happen.

Gavin forgot how words worked, and somehow he’s expected to keep up his side of banter and so on.

“Alright then,” Dan says, and yawns so wide Gavin can hear his jaw pop. “Might as well come inside for this.”

========

Ryan Haywood, with several PhD's to his name has a little lab of his own. Several lab assistants ins various stages of long-suffering, and a head of security who eyes the gear Gavin’s lugging with him like he’s got a bomb or something similar stashed in there somewhere.

The man himself is late, stuck in traffic and fifteen minutes out still, so Gavin sets up while he waits. 

Answers questions the lab assistant picked to help him has about the Phantom, offers to let him have a closer look, which is when Ryan walks into the lab.

Hair mussed up and this faint irritation to him as his gaze lands on them. This quiet huff as he comes over, glancing at his own experiments running in the background like he thinks Gavin or his assistant have mucked with them in his absence, and Gavin feels some of his excitement about the collaboration go sideways on him.

“Matt,” Ryan barks, startling his assistant so much the poor bastard knocks his head against the mic setup. “What are you doing?”

Matt darts a look at Gavin before he straightens out of the slouch he’s fallen into, steps out from behind Gavin’s equipment and rubs the back of his head sheepishly.

“Jeremy wanted someone to help Gavin out,” he says, all diplomatic and the like about them not wanting someone not versed in their particular lab’s protocol faffing about in here by themselves. 

Ryan tips his head to the side, irritation slipping away in exchange for the tiniest of smiles.

“And he picked you?” Ryan says, light touch of teasing to it. “Amazing.”

Matt sighs, all long-suffering about it and goes back to slouching, which Gavin can only assume means things are okay again.

“You’re an asshole,” Matt mumbles, hands shoves in the pockets of his lab coat. “In case you were unaware.”

Ryan laughs, and Gavin – embarrassingly – goes a little weak in the knees at the sound of it. Thankfully neither Ryan nor Matt seem to notice as they banter and bicker and tossing light-hearted insults at one another.

And then Ryan turns to Gavin, bright smile on his face and the English language completely abandons Gavin, because of course it does.

========

“You know,” Gavin says, several hours and who knows how many takes later. “I got the inspiration for our channel from watching your earlier videos.”

It’s been a long day of filming and Matt’s stepped out to grab them a late lunch/early dinner. Gavin’s regained his (admittedly shaky at times) command of English and Ryan is a bit of a mystery, for all Gavin did his homework before coming out here.

Several doctorates in various sciences and some dabbling in a dozen other disciplines. Some theater back in his college days and so on. A dozen or so patents, countless papers. Other things Gavin’s sure he’s forgetting, but all of it adds up to something far more impressive than shooting the sorts of videos Gavin and Dan do.

Stroke of luck that his neighbor happened to work with a film company using high-speed cameras, and dumb blind luck for the rest of it. (Luck, and hard work, but everyone including Gavin focus more on the luck bit.)

Ryan grunts, eyes flicking to Gavin’s tattered lab coat, covered in paint and remnants of goo and all kinds of souvenirs from past video shoots.

“You mentioned that before,” he says, lips curving. “When we met.”

Gavin blushes at the reminder, grateful for the dim lighting as he watches the footage they just shot. 

Their first meeting hadn’t exactly gone well when Burnie and Dan got called away to talk to sponsors for the channel, no.

Gavin fumbling his words and blathering on about Ryan inspiring him, giving Gavin the idea for him and Dan to wear lab coats in their videos. First as a joke, and then something of a gimmick for them. Pair of idiots filming ridiculous things in their backyards and spouting off nonsense that appealed to a wider audience than either of them ever expected it to.

Ryan’s – understandable – annoyance at them for making a mockery of people who'd earned to the right to wear lab coats. Spent years of their lives pursuing answers to questions science could provide and it had been...uncomfortable to say the least.

Gavin sure he’d made a mistake opening his dumb mouth to confess looking up to Ryan only for him to abruptly apologize, looking mortified at the things he’d said. (Sharp tone and cool words and Gavin pulling away from him, putting distance between them because the man did have a point.)

Gavin and Dan were careful not to claim they were scientists in any definition of the word, but tell that to journalists and bloggers out there discussing their videos. Showing them to their audiences and either willfully ignorant as to the facts or deliberately twisting them to draw more people in, who knows.

Bit insulting, really, having a pair of idiots like them counted alongside sorts like Ryan.

“I wasn’t kind about it,” Ryan muses, and there's something like guilt to it as he looks at Gavin. 

Gavin stares back, hand tightening on the edge of the table the Phantom’s resting on because they’re awfully close, aren’t they? Ryan watching him and Gavin confused as hell as to how that happened, or why Ryan’s looking at him the way he is. Lights down low in the lab to get decent footage and good God.

“Er,” Gavin says, feels himself. “You did apologize.”

Ryan hums, like he happens to disagree.

“Yes, well,” he says, stumbles over the words and shrugs helplessly. “It still wasn’t very nice of me, and I’m sorry about that.”

Ryan’s got this smile on his face, small and honest and Gavin is unable to look away because it feels like this is the first real glimpse he’s had of Ryan since they met, and it’s something to see, isn’t it?

Has him all tongue-tied, and it’s damn lucky that Matt happens to stumble back into the lab just then, arms laden down with bags of carry-out because hell if Gavin knows what to say.

========

“Gavin,” Dan says, leaning hard on his front door because it’s the middle of the night again and Gavin is an idiot because he keeps forgetting about the time difference and it’s costing Dan much needed sleep. “Filming go alright then?”

Gavin flails wordlessly at Dan who laughs at him as he lets him inside to spew gibberish until he remembers how to make proper sentences again.

========

When Gavin gets back home, it’s to find Michael settling in and a telepath poking about their new base. Hands in his pockets and this glint in his eye as he studies Gavin, slow smirk taking form.

“Ah,” Gavin says, and completely forgets every trick he learned about masking his thoughts because the bastard’s already seen and is clearly enjoying Gavin’s suffering. “You must be Ray.”


End file.
